Under the direction of Dr. Robert Blumenschine, MS. Joanne Tactikos will collect data for her doctoral dissertation. She will analyze a large sample of lithics (stone tools and their manufacturing byproducts) from two time horizons at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. Over the course of a multiyear NSF supported project, Dr. Blumenschine has concentrated on two units approximately 1.83 and 1.75 million years ago. Because these paleo- land surfaces are clearly defined in the geological sequence, it has been possible to follow them over many kilometers of sediment and to sample them systematically for both human shaped lithics and for faunal remains. Based on the fauna and on sedimentological characteristics the paleogeography has been reconstructed and it is possible, in principle, to map hominid activities in ecological context. While archaeologists traditionally focus on "sites", dense concentrations of lithics and faunal remains, Dr. Blumenschine's team has recognized that many hominid activities occur in a non-site context and leave only a modest imprint on the landscape. Thus his study incorporates both dense and more sparse material scatters. MS Tactikos will contribute to this larger endeavor through the systematic analysis of the lithic remains. She will categorize the two levels of Olduvai lithics according to standardized archaeological typology. She will then collect raw materials employed in their manufacture, duplicate the production techniques and then use the replicas to perform a variety of tasks such as cutting and scraping wood. On the basis of knowledge gained it will then be possible to refine and modify the original typology. With this information she can then examine the distribution of types on the reconstructed Olduvai landscapes to gain insight into early hominid land use patterns.
While early Olduvai hominids shared many attributes such as upright posture and tool use with their present day counterparts, they were in many ways behaviorally distinct. Because it is from such a base that modern humans developed, scientists wish to understand essential characteristics of early hominid lifestyle and large scale geographic studies such as Tactikos have the potential to help accomplish this. The research is also important because it will help to train a promising young scientist.
