327 — Lithic Landscapes: Early Human Impact from Stone Tool Production on the Central Saharan Environment

One of the most notable impacts today of early humans is that of prehistoric large-mammal hunting and domestication: This hunting and domestication still echoes in the modern planet ecology. The use of fire also greatly impacted the environment, though — limited to flammable materials — this impact is less obvious today.

But perhaps an even more noticeable feature of anthropogenic evolution is the huge impact stone tool use had on the physical landscape — a tradition that spans millions, not hundreds of thousands of years.

Because our stone-tool-using ancestors became reliant upon stone tools, the amount of stone tool production skyrocketed over a very short (evolutionarily speaking) number of years. The Messak Settafet mountain formations in the Sahara (in Libya) often has 75 “lithics” (stone artifacts) per square meter — a huge change to the otherwise mountainous landscape.

This suggests that the surface of the Messak Settafet is, technically, “man-made”: Considering that stone tool use has existed in Africa for at least 2.5 million years, and probably closer to 3, this means the entire ground later of the Settafet is likely a result of man-made stone tool construction or residue.

The mental image this gives me is of the Messak mountains rising above the (perhaps greener) Sahara, with “cities” of Pleistocene early hunter-gatherer humans flourishing across its surface for hundreds of thousands of years.