Fire and Its Roles in Early Hominid Lifeways

Author(s): J. D. Clark and J. W. K. Harris

Source: The African Archaeological Review , 1985, Vol. 3 (1985), pp. 3-27
Published by: Springer

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25130448

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The African Archaeological Review, 3 (1985), pp. 3-27

Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways

J. D. CLARK and J. W. K. HARRIS

Abstract

Discovery of the uses and later the invention of fire-making are fundamental to humanity.
Following reports over the last decade of traces of fire found on Lower Pleistocene
archaeological sites in eastern Africa, the dating of the control of fire by hominids has become
a controversial issue. In this paper we critically review the contexts and, in the light of a
battery of archaeometric techniques, the nature of reported instances of fire from Koobi Fora
and Chesowanja in Kenya, and from Gadeb and the Middle Awash in Ethiopia. We
conclude with a discussion of the roles fire may have played in the lifeways of early
Pleistocene savanna-living hominids.

Resume
La d?couverte des usages du feu et ensuite de sa pr?paration est fondamentale pour
Thumanit?. Suite ? des rapports au cours de la derni?re d?cennie signalant des traces de feu
relev?es dans des sites arch?ologiques du Pleistocene inf?rieur dans Fest de l'Afrique, la
datation du contr?le du feu par les hominiens est devenu une source de controverse. Dans cet
article, nous r?visons d'un oeil critique les contextes et la nature des cas de feu signal?s ?
Koobi Fora et ? Chesowanja au Kenya, et ? Gadeb et dans l'A wash moyen en Ethiopie, ? la
lumi?re d'une suite de techniques arch?ometriques. Suit en conclusion une discussion sur les
r?les qu'aurait pu jouer le feu dans les modes de vie des hominiens vivant dans les savannes
du Pleistocene inf?rieur.

Over the last decade the hypothesis for the great antiquity of humanly controlled fire has
been revived following reports of traces of fire at a number of archeological localities in the
Rift Valley of East Africa. The question of an early Pleistocene age for the controlled use of
fire by hominids is a crucial but controversial issue that clearly needs to be resolved as it has
far-reaching implications for our understanding of the mental abilities of early hominids,
their subsistence strategies, dietary breadth, and the ways in which they may have shaped
their environment using fire as a medium (Barbetti et al. 1978, 1980; Clark and Harris in
press; Dart 1948; Gowlett 1984; Gowlettetal. 1981, 1982;J. W. K. Harris 1978, 1983; Isaac
1982; Oakley 1961). This paper will review critically the context and the nature of this

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4 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Hams

evidence from four Lower Pleistocene sites in Kenya and Ethiopia (Fig. 1). Because obvious
traces were lacking, archaeomagnetic and other techniques were applied in the search for
evidence of fire. This paper discusses the results, and comments on the more controversial
issue of whether the archaeological evidence demonstrates that the fire was introduced and
controlled by early hominids. We also consider the broader implications for early hominid
adaptive patterns of behavior.

Background
It has long been recognized that fire in vegetation can be caused by natural phenomena as
well as human activities (West 1965). There are numerous instances of fires caused naturally
in the tropical and subtropical savanna mosaics of Africa. Furthermore, the pyrophytic

30? 40? 5.0?

Figure 1 East African localities with possible evidence of fire using

Pleistocene hominids.
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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 5

properties of the Brachystegia-Julbernia and comparable woodlands found over a very large
part of the central and south central regions of the continent and in West Africa show that
they have been burned over from the most ancient of times. Clearly lightning is a major
source of ignition of grass and bush fires, but well authenticated accounts indicate that a wide
variety of other natural causes of fire occasionally operate, including volcanic eruptions and
spontaneous combustion (Johnstone 1906; Daubenmire 1968; Phillips 1974; Pratt and
Gwynne 1977). Somewhat surprisingly, burned trees, the result of lightning strikes, are by no
means uncommon in tropical evergreen forest, as one of us (J.D.C.) was able to observe when
walking through the Ituri forest in northeast Zaire in 1984. In one instance the charred
remains of seven large forest trees were noted within a distance of six miles. Trees such as
these must have burned for several days?if not weeks or even months?since they are
consumed right down to the roots, leaving a mass of reddened earth and charcoal where the
tree had stood. Sometimes, when the trunk had fallen, a line of reddened soil shows where it
had lain and continued to smoulder. If this is typical of moist rainforest, it can be expected
that natural fires from lightning strikes would have been a fairly frequent phenomenon in the
dry savanna favoured by early hominids. However, there is general agreement that most fires
in the tropics are the result of human activity. In fact, the indiscriminate firing of vegetation is
still a widespread cultural trait among hunter-gatherers and agriculturalists alike, and, once
the fear of fire had been overcome, was also probably characteristic of very early humans
(Mellars 1976).
There has been a long standing and still unresolved debate about the origins and spread of
tropical savannas (D. R. Harris 1980). Sauer (1950) and Stewart (1956) considered fire the
most important or controlling factor in the origin and development of grasslands, which they
called a 'fire grass climax' (Vogel 1974). Clearly, the prolonged effects of fire upon savanna
habitats has resulted in the development of special fire tolerant communities that are
dependent on periodic burning for their existence (Glover 1968). However, the progressive
general decline of global temperatures during the Miocene, and accompanying secondary
effects such as changes in rainfall, had pronounced effects on the African continent resulting
in the expansion of more open woodland and savanna habitats at the expense of tropical rain
forest (Brain 1981a; Behrensmeyer 1982; Laporte and Zihlman 1983). In particular, the
combination of changes in climate and rainfall, together with major tectonic events
associated with the uplift of the Kenyan and Ethiopian domes, volcanism, and the rifting that
began in the Early and Middle Miocene in East Africa, were responsible for reducing the
tropical rain forest and for creating a varied mosaic of habitats (Andrews and Van Couvering
1975; Van Couvering and Van Couvering 1976; Behrensmeyer 1982).
A further dramatic change in climate reflected in desiccation around the Mediterranean
basin, is documented around the Miocene/Pliocene boundary (Hsu et al. 1977 and Adams et
al 1977). As Brain (1981a) has indicated, Hsu and his colleagues were the first to point out
that this aridity caused by the Messinian salinity crisis may have been responsible for the
spread of the East African savannas. If this is accepted (and clearly further evidence is
required), then it is probable that between five and six million years ago savanna mosaic
habitats with their marked seasonality of rainfall became widespread in eastern and southern
Africa. Following the establishment of extensive grasslands conducive to the free spread of
repeated fires at this time, fire probably became an important evolutionary force in
modifying the vegetation of tropical and subtropical savannas (Vogel 1974). Present-day

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 6 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

studies of East African savanna environments suggest, however, that fire was not the only
major influence in modifying the woody vegetation and extending the grassland element
(Glover 1968; Norton-Griffiths 1979). It is probable that fire in combination particularly
with large elephant and hippopotamus populations had a profound effect on savanna mosaic
habitats.
Fire caused by natural conflagrations was therefore almost certainly very much a part of
the overall savanna environmental context in which early representatives of our biological
family, the Hominidae, emerged. Pliocene and early Pleistocene localities yielding the earliest
hominid fossils and archaeological traces of their activities in and adjacent to the Ethiopian
and Gregory Rift Valleys of eastern Africa, as well as the interior plateau of southern Africa,
document the occupation by early hominids of a broad range of savanna habitats (Coppens et
al. 1976; Isaac and McCown 1976; Jolly 1978). Reports of fire have been incidental to the
main thrust of palaeoanthropological objectives in the study of these localities. However, in
tropical Africa physical traces of fire of great antiquity are hard to detect, especially in open
air contexts which are not conducive to the preservation over long periods of time of
conspicuous remains such as ash and charcoal (Oakley 1970; Isaac 1977; Barbetti et al.
1978). Hendy (1976) reported charred tortoise bone from the southern African Pliocene
deposit of Langebaarweg, burnt almost certainly as the result of a natural veld fire. In the
Pliocene deposits of the Middle Awash, Ethiopia, intensely reddened clay concentrations
were again almost certainly baked by natural fire in antiquity (Clark et al. 1984; Clark and
Harris in press; see discussion below). Similar sorts of burnt clay and soil materials have been
observed in the early Pleistocene deposits of the Koobi Fora Upper Member (Harris 1978;
Isaac 1982) and in the early Middle Pleistocene deposits at Olorgesailie (Isaac 1977),
presumably as a result of grass and bush fires sweeping across the landscapes (Isaac 1984).
So far the most informative evidence of early Pleistocene bush fires is Deschamps5 (1984)
finds of traumatic rings on fossil wood specimens recovered from Upper Member G (cal.7
myr) in the Omo Valley of Ethiopia. Deschamps reports that so far only one such instance
has been found that dates prior to Upper Member G times, although numerous fossil wood
specimens were examined from the older Members. Whether early hominids were involved
in this apparent increase in the incidence of bush fires is unknown.
It is perhaps of greater significance that the Omo evidence for bush fires becoming
markedly more prevalent around 1.7 myr coincides with a change to drier conditions in East
Africa. Secondary effects of climatic change are reflected in decreased rainfall (Cerling 1979;
Ceding etal. 1977) and vegetational change (Bonnefille 1976), as well as faunal communities
adapted to drier, more open, grassland conditions, the extinctions of others (Gentry 1976; J.
M. Harris 1976, 1983; Walker 1984), and the emergence of a new hominid species, Homo
erectus, by approximately 1.5 myr (Leakey and Walker 1976; Walker etal. 1982). In addition,
from this time on changes of a behavioral nature are reflected in the archaeological record.
The distribution of archaeological sites indicates, firstly, the movement into and occupation
by early hominids of habitats at higher elevations (2000 m), in Ethiopia just below the forest
zone on the hilly flanks of the Eastern Rift (Chavaillon et al. 1979; Clark and Kurashina 1979;
Leakey and Hay 1979; Williams et al. 1979). Secondly, the more open and less densely
vegetated interiors of sedimentary basins become more intensively occupied (Leakey 1971,
Clark et al. 1984; Hay 1976; J. W. K. Harris 1978, 1983). A shift towards hunting as a
subsistence strategy is also, although this hypothesis has been recently challenged by Binford

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 1

(1984), perhaps indicated by the evidence of butchery sites containing the remains of large
animals, as well as by the size and greater complexity of the Acheulian tool kit (Leakey 1971,
1975; Isaac 1975).
In the light of these changes, what role if any did fire play in the lifeways of newly emergent
Homo erectas on the tropical savannas of Africa? This is still a crucial but unresolved issue,
partly because the importance of fire has rarely been recognized in studies of Early
Pleistocene cultural evolution (Campbell 1981), and also because the use of fire has
traditionally been looked upon as a cultural response to the colonization of higher latitude
land masses (Oakley 1955, 1956, 1961, 1970; Pfeiffer 1978; Poirier 1974). In particular, the
controlled use of fire has usually been thought of as a cultural adaptation of Middle
Pleistocene and Upper Pleistocene hominid groups critical to survival in the cooler more
temperate to subarctic regions of Eurasia.
Until recently, these views have tended to be reinforced by the lack of any clear evidence
from the Lower and Middle Pleistocene of Africa. Although Raymond Dart (1948) suggested
that fossilized animal bones found alongside the remains of early hominids at the
Makapansgat cave site in South Africa were purposefully burnt, subsequent chemical tests
on a sample of bones from the cave analysed by Kenneth Oakley and his colleagues at the
British Museum failed to reveal unequivocal traces of fire (Oakley 1954, 1961). It was not
only on the basis of these results that prehistorians generally rejected Dart's notion that the
australopithecines were early fire users (Brain 1981b). Archaeological studies carried out at
Lower and Middle Pleistocene localities such as Olduvai Gorge, Kariandusi, Olorgesailie
and Isimila also failed to show any clear evidence for the use of fire (Howell and Clark 1963).
Certainly some of the later Acheulian populations of eastern and southern Africa were
making regular use of fire, as was clearly shown by evidence from three sites: the hearths in
the 30 ft of brecciated occupation deposit in the Cave of Hearths, Transvaal (Oakley 1955)
(Fig. 2) ; the burnt bone, in particular of catfish, at Nyabusora on the Kagera river in Uganda
(Posnansky 1962; Bishop 1969) and the charred logs (Fig. 3), other burned plant materials
and rare fire-fractured quartzite in the waterlogged Acheulian occupation horizons at
Kalambo Falls in northern Zambia (Clark 1969). It should also be noted that Chavaillon et
al (1979) report finding 'burned stones', interpreted as evidence for fire-using, on one of the
Upper Acheulian occupation floors (Garba I) at Melka Kunture. All this evidence seemingly
indicated that at least on the African continent the controlled use of fire was a relatively
recent prehistoric phenomenon (Clark 1969, 1970).
The view that early hominids successfully survived without fire in the tropical areas of the
Old World thus became generally accepted. This was particularly so for Africa where
regional climatic conditions were thought to be so mild that warmth would not have been a
problem (Pfeiffer 1971). Furthermore, these 'optimal' environments apparently offered such
a variety of food resources that there were no selection pressures on early hominids to enlarge
their dietary range by cooking food that was otherwise poisonous or unpalatable. In contrast,
it could be pointed out that the best known places for the earliest evidence of fire like
Yuanmou, Xihoudu, Lantian, Zhoukoudian (ail in China), Vertessz?l?s (Hungary) and
Terra Amata (France) were all located in cooler temperate regions where survival during the
winter months would have been problematical without fire. Not only do these sites preserve
traces of fire, but they are some of the earliest sites so far to document hominid occupation of
regions in Asia and Europe. A recent reanalysis of the ages of the earliest of these sites?

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8 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

Figure 2 The Basal Hearth at the Cave of Hearths associated with Acheulian handaxes
(preserved within the shelter in the right foreground). Some 5ft thick, this multi-layered
and colored dearth' is believed to have been a thick deposit of bat guano ignited by the
fires of the first human occupants. Its appearance is not unlike some of the thick
'hearths' described from Zhoukoudian, China. (Photo J.D.C.)

E
; ^ ^ ^ ^- ;;"

Figure 3 Charred logs from the waterlogged Occupation Horizon

Site B/2/59, Kalambo Falls, Zambia. {Photo J.D.C.)

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 9

Yuanmou, Xihoudu and Lantian?indicates that they fall between 0.7 myr and 1.0 myr
(Pope and Cronin 1984).
What then is the basis for suggesting that early Pleistocene hominids controlled fire prior
to movements out of the African continent approximately 1 million years ago? What adaptive
advantages would the controlled use of fire confer on early savanna-living hominid groups?

Case studies and critique

Over the last decade varying traces of fire have been reported from four early Pleistocene
localities in eastern Africa, the Middle Awash and Gadeb in Ethiopia and Koobi Fora and
Chesowanja in Kenya (Fig. 1 ). All the sites in question were situated on banks or in overbank
sedimentary contexts close to moving water and thus were subject to various taphonomic
processes during their formational history. Conspicuous remains of fire such as charcoals and
ashes would probably have disintegrated and been displaced either by wind or by low energy
fluvial conditions after the site was abandoned and during subsequent burial processes.
In view of the lack of obvious traces of fire in earlier Pleistocene deposits in tropical Africa,
one approach is to determine whether ancient sediments exposed at a site have been baked by
fire in antiquity. This can be attempted by the application of techniques developed in the
field of archaeometry: magnetic analysis, thermoluminescence and electron spin resonance
spectroscopy. These have been applied successfully elsewhere to demonstrate the presence or
absence of fire in a variety of open air and cave archaeological contexts, for example Lake
Mungo, Australia, the Etiolles and Marsangy Magdalenian sites, France and Calico Hills,
California (Barbetti and Allen 1972; Barbetti et al 1980; Bischoff etal. 1984; Hillman et al.
1983; Rowlett et al. 1974). The key to the recognition of baked areas at a site is the presence of
discolored reddish/orange patches. However color changes evident in ancient sediments are
not only due to the oxidation of ferromagnetic materials by fire; many deposits and soils can
be oxidized orange to red by natural agencies such as weathering and ground water effects
(Barbetti et al 1978, 1980; Eighmy 1980; Wendorf 1982). Discoloration alone is thus
insufficient to demonstrate that sediments were baked in antiquity.
A second approach is to identify stone artifacts, unmodified stones and/or associated
fossilized bones that show signs of thermal alteration. In the case of the thermal effects on
lithics, in addition to determining temperature changes as a result of firing by using
archaeometric techniques, more obvious physical changes such as discoloration, burnishing,
and pot-lid fracture may be apparent. Fire discolors bone to give a blackened appearance,
and heat from a fire cracks and warps it. A recent pioneering study by Shipman et al. (1984)
that utilizes scanning electron microscopy holds the promise of determining whether bones
have undergone ultrastructural and minerological changes as a result of exposure to high
temperatures.
Barbetti et al. (1978) have pointed out that to demonstrate that early hominids controlled
fire requires two investigative steps. The first is to prove that fire was present at an
archaeological site, the second to show whether or not it was introduced or controlled by
hominids. Archaeometric techniques or the presence of thermally altered artefacts and bone
may well establish the presence of fire at a site. Identification of the agencies responsible is
much more complex, especially if hearths or nearby features that unequivocally indicate
hominid involvement are lacking.

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 10 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

Koobi Fora, northern Kenya

Near the eastern shores of Lake Turkana at Koobi Fora, Lower Pleistocene archaeological
sites attributed to the Karari Industry are particularly numerous in the Okote Tuffaceous
Beds found outcropping along the western face of the Karari Escarpment (Harris 1978;
Harris and Isaac 1976), Large scale excavations undertaken in minimally disturbed silty
flood plain sediments have been dated to approximately 1.5 myr (Isaac and Harris, 1978). At
one of these, Fxjj 20 East, patches of reddish/orange sediments possibly discolored as a result
of baking were observed near the base of the archaeological horizon. Fxjj 20 East is an
extraordinarily rich site yielding very fresh basalt cores and flaking debris associated with
fragmentary fossilized bone including a hominid mandible, KNMER 3230, attributed to the
robust australopithecine lineage of East Africa, Australopithecus boisei. As part of the overall
site investigation, our interest in the discolored patches on the excavation was heightened as
a result of observations made along the Lake Turkana shore and adjacent floodplain. Here,
at camp sites recently abandoned by local peoples, similar reddish orange patches of
sediment could be seen that had been baked by the heat of their camp fires.
The archaeological features measured approximately 30 to 40 cm in diameter and were 10
to 15 cm in thickness (Figs 4 and 5). Three of the four consisted of a blocky consolidated mass
of sandy silts showing a slight reddish/orange hue (2.5R 7/2) with some flecks of stronger red
as well as paler root mark streaks. The fourth sandy silt patch consisted of a blackened zone
with an intense gray/black hue (5YR 4/1) associated in part with calcification. The
surrounding silts are pale yellowish/brown. Orientated blocks were cut from the discolored
patches as well as, for control purposes, from the surrounding silts, and submitted to Dr
Michael Barbetti and his associates (then at the Research Laboratory for Art and Archaeo
logy, Oxford University). The preliminary archaeomagnetic and thermoluminescence
studies did not confirm that discoloration was due to fire but were inconclusive tending to
negative (Barbetti et al, 1978). However, several samples yielded anomalous results that
required following up.
In 1984, further samples were collected and analysed from Fxjj 20 East and also from a
discolored patch discovered some one hundred meters away, exposed on an adjacent outcrop
at approximately the same stratigraphie level. Dr William Kean (pers. comm.) of the
Geology Department of the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, reports, following alternat
ing field and thermal demagnetization of the samples, that the southernly most discolored
patch (Fig. 5) at Fxjj 20 East as well as the one in the adjacent exposure, show strong
indications of having been heated by fire in antiquity. The temperatures to which they were
baked ranged from approximately 200?C to 400?C.
Highly localized patches in and adjacent to Fxjj 20 East were thus apparently fired in
antiquity. Any attempt to evaluate whether the fires were humanly controlled by reference to
the temperatures to which sediments were baked must however take into account a
substantial overlap in the range of temperatures generated by burning tree trunks on the one
hand and camp fires on the other. Four hundred degrees C is a normal temperature for open
camp fires, which seldom exceed 700?C (Tylecote 1962), whereas temperatures of 34O-380?C
have been recorded on the windward side of burning pine trees in contrast to temperatures of
700-790?C to the leeward (Fahnestock and Hare 1964). However, there is general agreement
based upon many recorded reports that although grass and bush fires generate high

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Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways
11

Figure 4 The discolored patches shown pedestaled during the latter stages of
excavation, Fxjj 20 East, Karari Escarpment, east of Lake Turkana. The most northerly
patch was a blackened zone whereas the other three patches were zones of reddish
orange discoloration. Note the arc-like pattern to the arrangement of the discolored
patches. The arrow marks the most southerly patch shown in Figure 5. (Photo J.W.K.H.)

Figure 5 The most southerly patch of reddish-orange discolored sediment, shown

pedestaled at Fxjj 20 East, Karari Escarpment, east of Lake Turkana. Archaeomagnetic
analysis of the block cut by Dr H. Merrick of the National Museums of Kenya (shown
in the photo) indicated heating by fire in antiquity. (Photo J.W.K.H.)

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 12 J.D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

temperatures above the ground, these rapidly drop off below the soil surface (Wright and
Bailey 1982; Humphreys and Craig 1981; West 1965). It is equally clear that the degree of
soil heating during any particular fire is highly variable and depends on a variety of factors
including type of fuel, fire intensity, nature of the litter layer, and soil properties (Wells et al.
1979).
In attempting to resolve this major research issue of distinguishing natural from humanly
controlled fire in antiquity and in particular at Fxjj 20 East, a second line of evidence was the
thermally altered stone artifacts found at the site. During the typological analysis, it was
noted that a number of specimens were discolored black or a reddish-orange color,
apparently as a result of firing. In one instance, a flake was discolored reddish orange while
other pieces from the same core were unchanged (Kroll in prep.). We also noted that the
patches of discolored sediments formed an arc-like pattern across the excavated surface. It is
perhaps significant that the patches partially define the perimeters of the highest concentra
tion of stone artifacts and fossilized bone debris recovered from the excavation. Until,
however, a quantitative reanalysis of the stone artifacts to systematically identify fire-altered
specimens is undertaken, and this is followed up by studies of the distribution of the fire
altered specimens in relation to the discolored patches, the meaning of this spatial association
remains unclear.
Discolored patches as well as thermally altered stone artifacts have been observed and
recorded from two other sites in the near vicinity, Fxjj 20 Main and Fxjj 20 AB (Harris
1978). These sites have not yet been systematically studied for evidence of fire. Clearly, the
Karari sites hold great potential for addressing the problem of the antiquity of humanly
controlled fire. Highly localized baked sediments and thermally altered artifacts discovered
at several archaeological sites are suggestive. However, discolored patches observed
elsewhere along the Karari Escarpment may result from fires of natural origin that swept
over the landscape from time to time. Humanly controlled fire is as yet by no means certain.

Chesowanja, Kenya

Clearly germane to any attempt to distinguish humanly controlled fire is a hearth-like

arrangement of baked clay clasts, stone artifacts and unmodified stones found at Chesowanja
(Fig. 6). This site is situated on the east side of Lake Baringo near the foot of the Laikipia
Escarpment in the Kenya Rift (Fig. 7). During the early 1970s, the geology and geo
chronology of the small area (4 km2) of Pleistocene deposits was worked out in detail by the
late Professor W. W. Bishop and his associates (Carney et al. 1971; Bishop et al. 1975).
Fossilized fauna, including three hominid specimens attributed to the robust australopithe
cine lineage, as well as Oldowan and Acheulian artifacts, were discovered on the surface of
deposits of Lower Pleistocene age. At Bishop's invitation, systematic archaeological excava
tions were undertaken in 1978 by John Gowlett and the junior author (Gowlett et al. 1981,
1982; Harris and Gowlett 1980; Harris et al. 1981, in press, in prep.).
At one of these excavations, designated site Gnji 1/6E (Fig. 8), stone artifacts, fossilized
faunal remains, and baked clay clasts were recovered in situ from fine grained clayey silt
deposits found outcropping in the Chemoigut Formation, which underlies a basalt dated to
1.42?0.07 myr determined by the K-Ar isotope method (Hooker and Miller 1979). Figure 9
shows the horizontal distribution of finds recovered from 40 m2 excavated area. In addition,

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 13

Figure 6 The hearth-like arrangement of stone artifacts, unmodified cobbles and baked
clay clasts shown in closeup in the northwest corner of the excavated area, Gnji 1/6E,
Chesowanja. {Photo J.A.J. Gowlett).

the fragmentary cranial remains of another hominid were discovered on the surface only a
few meters away from the excavation. The hominid specimen, KNM-CH-304, was classified
as Australopithecus boisei, which so far is the only hominid species to be found at Chesowanja
(Gowlett etal. 1981).
Fifty-one reddish/brown clasts of clay were recovered from the excavated area, ranging in
size from tiny flecks to lumps 5-7 cm across. Samples were submitted to Dr D. Walton of
McMaster University for archeomagnetic analysis with results that clearly indicated that the
clay had been baked by fire in antiquity {ibid.). Furthermore, the lumps of clay were scattered
across the excavated area and were incorporated into the archaeological horizon, ruling out
any possibility that the burnt materials derive from more recent superficial deposits.
Preliminary analysis of the spatial configuration of materials show that the largest lumps of
baked clay, ten fragments totalling 800 g, together with a high proportion of the cores,
modified/battered and unmodified cobbles, were concentrated together in a 3 m2 area in the
northwest corner of the excavation (Figs 6 and 9). Whether this conspicuous cluster can be
interpreted as a hearth is partly contingent on how well the site formational processes are
understood. A sedimentological study undertaken by J. Kort, of the Geology Department,
University of Wisconsin, indicated that the silty clay sediments at the site were laid down in a
low energy fluvial environment (Harris et al in prep.). However, there are small pockets of
coarse sandy sediments, interstratified and interfingering with the silty clays, so that it is
possible that the archaeological materials were rearranged and concentrated in a small
runnel formed during periods of high rainfall and sheet wash (cf. Isaac 1982). This may
account for the linear horizontal patterning of archaeological materials across the site. If this

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 14 J. D. Clark and]. W. K. Harns

was the result of fluvial processes, then according to experimental evidence (Harris 1978;
Isaac 1977; Schick 1984) stone artifact size sorting would be expected along the path of the
possible runnel. Statistical testing based upon the linear regression of the maximum
dimensions of pieces indicates no significant size sorting of the stone artifacts (J. Maiers pers.
comm.; Harris et al in prep.). On the other hand, Figure 10 clearly shows that baked clay
pieces are horizontally distributed within this possible runnel feature. As noted above, many
of the largest lumps of baked clay are concentrated in the northwest corner, but as several
larger lumps occur outside this cluster a significant pattern to the size sorting is not clearly
evident.
In contrast (and irrespective of the meaning of the spatial association of the faunal remains
with the other finds), it is relevant to understanding of the overall taphonomic context that
bones of various transport potentials are well represented at the site. In addition to the
independent criterion for assessing fluvial size sorting by analysis of the nature of the bone
elements present (Voorhies 1969), the maximum dimensions of the individual bones

Figure 7 Chesowanja locality map showing the key site for traces of fire, Gnji 1/6E.
Inset includes the location of sites found within the Kapthurin Formation, west of Lake
Baringo, currently under investigation by Dr F. Van Noten. One of us (J.W.K.H.)
visited the sites in 1984, One site being excavated by J. Gessels also showed possible
evidence for traces of fire.

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways
15

Figure 8 The site of Gnji 1/6E, Chesowanja, shown during excavation in 1978. The
hearth-like arrangement of baked clay clasts, stone artifacts and unmodified cobbles is in
the front of the excavated area. The arrow marks the find spot of the hominid specimen
attributed to Australopithecus boisei. (Photo JA.J. Gowlett.)

C h c s o o.? s n. j -i 5i D IT? ? Cl*y - +

1---6E Site Bone Tool - *

] IE

3 11 ?f? M

ir?.-.''-. V -. .
3 12 -vTB*2Vv#?. N
?*i?.
*>.
1 13
-r" a?.
-'*
1 1-1

?3
1 15

91 94 05 96 07 B? SB 9Q

Figure 9 Horizontal distribution of stone artifacts (=tool), unmodi

(=stone), fragmentary bone and baked clay clasts from the excavat
South/81-90 East, Gnji 1/6E, Chesowanja.

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16 J. D. Clark and]. W. K. Harris

Chesoujan ja
1 10 1./6E Si te Ci ay - +

111

U2

113

)H

j 15

Bl B2 93 34 ?S ?S 07 ?td B9 S?

Figure 10 The horizontal distrib

Gnji 1/6E, Chesowanja.

scattered across the site show no p

size between 14 mm and 262 mm
features of the faunal assemblag
disturbed context.
Chesowanja offers the strongest
hominids. However, until the con
field investigations, here too the

Gadeb, Ethiopia

The site of Gadeb, excavated and

edge of the Southeast Plateau of Et
here cut through a series of lacustr
that have been dated between ca
between ca 1.5 and 0.7 myr, a ti
breaching of the late Pliocene lav
1979). The hominid occupation s
and some 15 m of fine fluvial s
sequence of Developed Oldowan a
the whole sealed by a massive sa
Some 90 m2 of a rich Acheulian
was situated on a gravel bar in the
is sealed by fine-grained sands, s
activity is likely but no preferred
mostly of basalt, trachy basalt and

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 17

three was stream boulders, probably obtained nearby, but the welded tuff had to be carried
in, the nearest outcrop at present being 6 km away. In fresh sections the welded tuff is light
brown in color; on exposure it becomes patinated to a light gray. As excavation proceeded,
several weathered angular fragments of these rocks were found that showed differential dark
gray and red discoloration such as could have been caused by fire. This became apparent
only in the closing stages of the excavation as the occupation horizons were being plotted and
the artifacts lifted. It was, therefore, only the ten examples found towards the end of the work
that were retained for examination. For the most part these possibly burned rocks occurred
singly, but a group of four such fragments found in the 1 m grid square H4 resembled rocks
associated with a hearth.
Since palaeomagnetic techniques have been shown to be well suited to determining
whether sediments or rocks have been heated in antiquity, these samples were submitted for
analysis to Dr M. Barbetti of the University of Sydney Radiocarbon Laboratory, and his
findings were published in 1980 (Barbetti et al 1980). Unfortunately only one of our samples
was roughly orientated but the direction of magnetism was found to be more or less consistent
with that expected. All these samples, and, in addition, two from a local Iron Age site that are
believed to have been burned and a sample of the welded tuff from the outcrop, have Natural
R?manent Magnetism (NRM) that is clearly thermoremanent in origin. Assessment of the
results of the analysis as evidence for or against fire is complicated by the need to distinguish
between geological and archaeological thermoremanent magnetism. If fire was present,
stable directions of magnetism consistent between samples and identical ancient field
strengths of different rock types are to be expected. The results from Gadeb show elements of
both thermoremanent categories. Unfortunately directions of magnetism of samples in the
field were, with one exception, not recorded. The consistency shown by this specimen could
have been due to firing, or might be pure chance. Ancient field strengths appear to differ for
two of the Acheulian samples and the two Iron Age ones, even though all were probably
derived from the same rock unit. This difference could be due to differences in magnetic
mineralogy or weathering, or to heating of some but not all of the stones. It is of more
significance that four of the Acheulian specimens have identical ancient field strengths
regardless of rock type, and that three of these differ from the fresh tuff sample. Barbetti
concludes that these results, together with the directional data for the one orientated sample
and the generally similar field strengths of the two burnt Iron Age specimens, put the weight
of evidence marginally in favor of fire.

Middle Awash, Ethiopia:

The evidence from Gadeb, Koobi Fora and Chesowanja suggests, though it is certainly not
conclusive, that Lower Pleistocene hominids may have been making use of, though probably
not manufacturing, fire as early as 1.5-1.0 myr on the high plains of eastern Ethiopia and in
the East African Rift Valley. How far back in time are we justified in inferring that hominids
were fire users? With this is bound up the question as to how a slender, relatively defenseless,
bipedal ancestral australopithecine was able to become a successful savanna ground dweller
and not fall victim to regular pr?dation from large carnivores. Some efficient defense system
must have been in operation. Research in the Middle Awash region of the Ethiopian Rift may
help to provide the answer.

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 18 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

In the course of the 1981 survey of sediments ranging in age from late Miocene (upwards of
6.0 myr) to Holocene in the Middle Awash study area in the Afar Rift, the interdisciplinary
team observed a number of patches of intensely reddened clay, sometimes in overbank silts,
sometimes in sands or in clays. These were relatively discrete, cone-shaped concentrations
varying between ca 40 and 80 cm in diameter. Since the clay was generally more resistant to
erosion than the surrounding sediments, they occurred in the form of small, low mounds
some 20-30 cm high. These were found in all stages of erosion from those just appearing to
others that were largely dispersed and spread down-slope. They occur in sediments of
Pliocene to earlier Pleistocene age. In some instances the clay forms irregular pellicules but in
others, in particular near the base, it is more massive. Only in one example so far have we
observed evidence of structure in the form of several channels looking remarkably like those
made by termites. Dr Barbetti (pers. comm.) has examined samples of these clay occurrences
form one Oldowan (Bodo A-4) and one Acheulian (HAR-A3) site, and has found that they
are indeed concentrations of burned clay. As they exhibit reversed polarity and uniform
magnetic strength they cannot be the result of lightning strikes. The minimum temperature
to which they have been baked was 200?C though it could have been appreciably higher.
Those in Pliocene sediments have, as might be expected, no artifacts associated, but the
earlier Pleistocene examples sometimes have stone artifacts?both Oldowan and
Acheulian?and bone in the immediate vicinity. Others again appear to be quite unassoci
ated with artifacts.
Two of these features in the Bodo stream drainage, adjacent to the site of the discovery of a
new cranial fragment of H. erectus and with a few artifacts in the immediate vicinity, were
sectioned by M. A. J. Williams and Carole Sussman. Feature 1 was at the apex of a low
mound and its greater compactness compared to the surrounding matrix was presumably
responsible for slowing down erosion. Small pellicules of fire-hardened clay were spread
down the eroded slope as far as 1.5 m from the feature, the surviving part of which was
lozenge-shaped in cross-section, some 40 cm in diameter, 20 cm high and with a concave
base. Feature 2 was 50 cm in diameter and some 12-19 cm in depth. The base of this second
example was also generally concave; the sediment in which both occurred was a dark, gray
brown clay. There was a fair amount of color change from red to yellow between the center
and peripheral parts of the feature, the fire reddening varying from strong to weak. Although
artifacts and bone occurred in the immediate vicinity, none were found within either of these
features. These burned clay patches cannot be the results of lightning strikes since fulgurites
are totally different and easily distinguishable. Neither are they the hearths of early man
since they bear little or no resemblance to any known human hearth structures. Unless the
fires had been continuous over a longish period of time, surrounding sediments would not
have been baked in this way and, even if this could have happened where the sediment matrix
was clay, it would not have occurred with those examples in silts and sands. One, and the
most likely, explanation is that they are burned tree stumps and that the burned clay is
termite earth that was on the stump at the time it was burnt. Even though we observed no
burned root areas, systematic sectioning, comparison with modern analogues and experi
ment should prove whether this is the correct interpretation. The possible relevance of these
findings to defense and other aspects of early hominid lifeways is discussed in the following
concluding section of this paper.

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 19

Adaptive advantages of fire

As indicated in the introduction, fire caused by natural conflagrations was probably a regular
event on the tropical African savannas in which early hominids emerged during the Pliocene
and early Pleistocene. A major bush fire is obviously an awesome spectacle, but early
hominids must have been attracted by contained fire in the same way as are other animals.
David Livingstone observed in Botswana hawks and other birds picking offinsects and small
mammals fleeing in front of a bush fire (Schapera 1960: 280). Rooks and crows will 'dance'?
anting, it is called?with their wings outstretched in front of a field fire so that the smoke gets
rid of the small insects that infest them (Burton 1959: 99-109). Cattle will crowd round a
dung fire within a cattle kraal to help keep the mosquitoes at a distance, and the Phillipine
Tarsius was named T. carbonarius due to its observed propensity for picking red hot coals out
of the camp fire at night (Oakley 1961 ). Chimpanzees do not fear fire and, although they have
not been observed to use it, they have been seen to jump through gaps in a bush fire (Jane
Goodall pers. comm.). It would not be unreasonable to assume that early hominids had
learned to live with natural bush fires and so were not particularly afraid of them. Did they,
however, use any of the advantages natural fire could give them? Some possibilities are
shown in Figure 11.
Initially, in the absence of any method of making it, the fire would have come from natural

NATURAL FIRE
LIGHTNING STRIKES, VOLCANOES,
SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION
OPPORTUNISTIC USE -,

ADVANCING FIRE FRONT

SCROUNGING INSECTS / SMALL ANIMALS
ESCAPING FROM PIRE

OVER-PASSED FIRE AREA

~7~" -J
FIRE STILL GRUBS/HONEY BUR
BURROWI
BURNING VEGE1ATION FROM FALLEN TREES SMOKE SU
ANIM

INTENTIO
I
ROASTING
S/
AGGRESSION
TRANSPOR
PLANT AND ANIMAL AIDING
TOCOMPETI
OTHER
FOODS IN SCAVENGING

MEAT DRYING
PRESERVATION

TOOL MAKING
DIGGING STICKS, SPEARS, ETC'

DISINFESTATION
PRE-DET

MANIPULATION OF PLANT ANO ANIMAL

COMMUNITIES
CONTROLLED SEASONAL BURNING
- ?
IMPROVED VISIBILIT
FOR FORAGING, ETC

Figure 11 Some possible

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 20 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

sources?lightning strikes and spontaneous combustion are among these. Active volcanoes
are another possibility, and in and adjacent to the African Rift Valley it was perhaps not all
that difficult to obtain fire from such a source. Once fire had been obtained it could have been
kept by careful conservation. One way in which this might have been done was recently
brought home to the senior author during field work in India.
In an area of woodland in northern central India now being exploited to obtain material
for house-building, we observed tree stumps that had, since only the stump was burned,
clearly been deliberately fired. A local farmer working near one such group of stumps
informed us that he had set them alight in order to have fire readily available where he was
working. Sometimes one or two burnt stumps were close to each other; sometimes several
hundred yards separated them. One of these, he told us, would burn for some seven or eight
days, after which he set fire to another stump if fire was still required. On another occasion in
India we observed a still-burning tree stump that had provided fire during an overnight stop
for a family of Sefar shepherds. It was left burning after the group had departed. This was
also a well-known practice among Australian aborigines; one old eucalyptus tree, under
scientific observation the whole time, burned for eight months (M. Clarke pers. comm.).
Examples could be cited from most other parts of the world.
In India, as in Africa, when a tree begins to die termites will start to attack it and, if the tree
is later set alight, the burned termite earth can be clearly seen around the hollow where the
stump had been, preserving something of the structure of the hole. The earth is hardened,
reddened and partly broken down into irregular pellicules, as are the clay features in the
Afar. The concave interior often contains fragments of burned clay fallen from the sides.
Although it is going to be difficult to prove it, this ethnographic evidence provides a ready
and simple explanation for the way that fire could have been conserved very successfully from
as far back as when our hominid ancestors first began to be bipedal and had their hands
available for manipulating things. From observing and making use of burning stumps and
branches it must have been a relatively short step for an intelligent primate to make use of
already burning wood to set alight other dry vegetation, providing that the advantages fire
could give were sufficiently compelling. The advantages of fire-using would have been very
great for the australopithecines and Homo habilis as well as for Homo erectas. If, as we believe,
meat formed a significant part of the diet of the early hominids, then it is not difficult to see
how hominids, like birds and small carnivores, might have taken advantage of an advancing
fire-front that offered good opportunities for catching a range of animals fleeing from its
path?insects, rodents and larger mammals. Once the fire had passed by, the digging up of
suffocated burrowing animals would have led to significant, if not essential, additions to the
diet. Other possibilities would have been the collection of honey from bees' nests in fallen
trees and termites from a burned termitery. Carcases of larger animals overcome by fires
would also have been exploited.
The other most important source of food is plants and it is usually, and no doubt correctly,
assumed that our early ancestors were chiefly vegetarian. It needs to be remembered,
however, that many plant foods taken for granted today, since we eat them cooked, contain
secondary toxins, and that it is only by cooking that their chemical dangers can be overcome
(Leopold and Ardrey 1972). Some of the toxins (e.g., anti-enzymes, glycosides, hemaglutins,
tannins and alkaloids) in such common classes as grains, legumes and many buried foods
such as tubers will, if eaten raw for any length of time, produce severe incapacity,

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 21

malnutrition and death. The impact of toxins is greatly reduced by cooking (Stahl 1984).
Some means of reducing the toxic effects of raw vegetable foods, including perhaps seasonal
selection for those of low toxicity, would have been necessary. Also since proteins cannot be
stored in the human body and amino acids must be ingested on a regular basis, the small
quantity of protein available in plant foods could have stimulated the acquisition of animal
protein as a regular part of early human diet. Plant toxins and the difficulty of obtaining
sufficient protein from vegetables may also account for the importance of insects (ants and
termites) in the diet of chimpanzees and, it might be inferred, of early hominids also. Indeed,
insects?termites, ants, caterpillars, locusts, crickets?still remain important sources of
protein for some African peoples, and termites in particular are regularly trapped and
collected by peoples in many parts of Africa today, for example by the Zande, to whom they
are the most highly prized delicacy (Culwick 1950: 40-104). Plant toxins can be significantly
reduced so that more of the plant can be consumed if parts are roasted in a fire before eating.
Cooking also significantly reduces amounts of bacteria, yeasts and molds. It would not have
been beyond the ability of early hominids to have parched and roasted plant parts and meat if
the advantages of so doing had been perceived.
Another practical use of fire by 'middle of the day' scavengers, as there is increasing reason
to believe the early humans may have been, is for protection of the group at the 'home base5
where they would have been vulnerable to predators, and their meat and bone sources would
need to be protected from other scavengers. Indeed, fire in the form of burning brands might
even have been used to advantage in driving carnivores from their kills. These early hominid
groups must have been highly mobile, opportunistic scavengers, but the transport of fire can
hardly have posed a problem since it could have been carried from place to place, as is done
today, in the form of slow-burning, smouldering branches.
By 1.5 myr early hominid body size had greatly increased with the appearance of Homo
erectas (Walker et al 1982; see also Leakey and Walker's recent important discovery on the
west side of Lake Turkana reported in Lewin 1984). Extension of the home range is an
ecological effect of increase in body size (Foley 1984; Walker 1984). Moreover, larger
quantities of food are required because of higher metabolic rates. Therefore, the transport of
fire using simple brands may have provided a means of protection against larger animals,
especially carnivores, in permitting early hominids to increase their home ranges by moving
into new and unfamiliar habitats and also by more efficiently exploiting the more open
grasslands, where tree and bush cover were more restricted. As noted above (p. 6) the
distribution of archaeological and hominid sites approximately 1.5 million years ago and
thereafter could be taken to imply greatly increased home ranges.
Most hunting/gathering peoples, when they first came under historical observation, were
careful conservers of fire. Perhaps the classic example is that of the Andaman Islanders who
are said to have had no known method of making fire. 'Fires,' Radcliffe-Brown (1964: 201)
says, 'were and still are carefully kept alive in the village and are carefully carried when
travelling. Every hunting party carries its fire with it. The natives are very skillful in selecting
wood that will smoulder for a long time without going out and without breaking into flame.'
Again, of the Tasmanians, because it was not easy to make fire especially in wet weather, La
Billardi?re in 1791-93 observed, 'they generally in their peregrinations carried with them a
few sticks lighted at their last encampment. These firesticks were pieces of decayed wood,
lighted at one end and burning slowly' (Roth 1899:84). The so-called 'tribal peoples' in India

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 22 J. D. Clark andj. W. K. Harris

also rarely light fires but kindle them from charcoals carried from existing fires. It is a
common sight to see coals being carried from one place to another on a broken tile. Indeed, if
the burning of tree stumps was a common way of conserving fire in ancient as in modern
times, no difficulty is envisaged in transporting fire from one site to another but it is unlikely
that, unless the log was termite infested, evidence of its presence would survive. Radcliffe
Brown (1964: 258) describes fire for the Andaman ese:

... as the one object on which the society depends most of all for its well-being. It provides
warmth on cold nights; it is the means whereby they prepare their food, for they eat nothing
raw save a few fruits; it is the possession that has to be carefully guarded, for they have no
means of producing it and must therefore take care that it is always alight; it is the first thing
they think of carrying with them when they go on a journey by land or sea; it is the centre
round which the social life moves, the family hearth being the centre of the family life while the
communal cooking place is the centre round which the men often gather after a day's hunting
is over. To the mind of the Andaman Islander, therefore, the social life of which his own life is
a fragment, the social well-being which is the cause of his own happiness, depends on the
possession of fire without which the society could not exist. In this way it comes about that his
dependence on the society appears in his consciousness as a sense of dependence upon fire and
a belief that it possesses power to protect him from dangers of all kinds. Indeed, the
Andamanese believe it is the possession of fire that makes human beings what they are and
distinguishes them from animals.

It would not be difficult to make equally as strong a case for its having been fire?every bit
as much as food-sharing or meat-eating or new forms of sexual behavior?that helped to weld
early hominid groups into the coherent family units that are the characteristic of human
society. That it has not been thought of as such is surely due to the fact that the evidence of fire
has not generally survived, or has not been recognized, in Plio-Pleistocene sediments in the
tropics. The occurrences we have been considering may be some of the surviving evidences of
fire conservation and use by early hominids. Too much remains supposition, but a beginning
has been made and what is now needed is systematic study and analysis of many such
occurrences, together with experimentation to determine evidences of combustion,
temperature ranges, variation in the structure and form of fire-related features, and also
whether artifacts and bone can be shown to be significantly related to some of the latter. This
could be one of the potentially most profitable and compelling studies in palaeoanthropology
today, for there is no doubt that the use, and later the making of fire, is fundamental to
humanity. Did this come early or relatively late? It is for future researchers to take up this
'quest for fire'.

Acknowledgements
We wish to acknowledge the assistance, advice and encouragement from all our colleagues
involved in palaeoanthropological studies in East Africa, particularly those field investi
gators where traces of fire have been found; the Middle Awash, Gadeb, Koobi Fora and
Chesowanja. Also, we wish specifically to acknowledge the major contribution of Dr Michael
Barbetti of the University of Sydney by his pioneering archaeomagnetic studies in East
Africa.
We wish to acknowledge funding for the archaeological studies in East Africa that lead to
the current fire investigation from the National Science Foundation, the National Geo

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 Fire and its roles in early hominid lifeways 23

graphic Society, the L.S.B. Leakey Foundation and the Foundation for Research on Early
Man. J.W.K.H. wishes to acknowledge continuing support from Diana Holt and the Holt
Family Foundation. His trip to East Africa in 1984 and his current studies on fire are in part
the results of funding from the Graduate School, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, which
is gratefully acknowledged.

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