Renewed impetus for Stone Age research in the Eastern Free State (South Africa) centred on Rose Cottage Cave

Abstract

Rose Cottage Cave is widely recognised as a key sequence for theMiddle Stone Age and Later Stone Age in the southern Africancentral interior, with its unique palaeoenvironmental and chronoculturalarchive spanning a semi-continuous record from the LatePleistocene to the 19th century. Building on important previousresearch, new excavations will extend our knowledge concerningtechnological systems, landscape use, human-environmentinteractions, as well as site formation and the linkages between theseparameters in a regional context. Here we report on preliminaryinsights from the recent fieldwork and provide an overview offuture directions.