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Desert Graves reveal a Greener Sahara |
A Stone Age graveyard has been discovered at a site called Gobero in the deserts of northern Niger. Some 200 graves found on the shores of a vanished lake throw light on life in a once fertile land. Could these be the graves of the artists who carved elaborate petroglyphs such as the life-size Dabous giraffe?
During the Bradshaw Foundation expedition to the Tenere Desert in Niger in 1999 to take a mould of the Dabous giraffe carvings, the team travelled north of Dabous to explore an area of desert where there were reports of archaeological remains on the shores of an extinct lake.
The team indeed found numerous and varied artifacts on the desert floor, ranging from arrow heads and stone axe heads to shards of pottery. Although there was clear evidence of sedentary life involving hunting and gathering, little did we realize we were standing on top of further evidence of this past life-style that reflected a greener Sahara, and evidence which would later provide clues as to who the original artists of the giraffe carvings just to the south were and when they were carved. At this time Dr Jean Clottes estimated that the carvings were between 7,000 and 10,000 years old.
It was a year later that the new evidence at the site, now named Gobero, was excavated. As reported in New Scientist August 2008, and in National Geographic magazine September 2008, Paul Sereno, one of National Geographic's explorers-in-residence, visited the 10,000-year-old site, during a dinosaur-hunting expedition in 2000.
The subsequent excavation of a graveyard on the shore of this dried-up lake suggests that at least two Stone Age peoples once lived there. Some 200 graves excavated so far reveal intriguing clues about these desert dwellers.
First came the Kiffian, who grew up to 2 metres tall and hunted wild game, the bones of which were found nearby. They vanished when the Sahara entered a dry spell about 8000 years ago, to be replaced by the shorter, leaner Tenerians when the rains returned a millennium later. Bones and artefacts imply that they herded cattle and hunted fish and wildlife.
'The most amazing find so far is a grave with a female and two children hugging each other,' says team member Elana Garcea of the University of Cassino in Italy. 'This strongly indicates they had spiritual beliefs and cared for their dead.'
Bradshaw Foundation
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