Nazlet Khater is a series of eight archaeological sites with Middle and Upper Paleolithic occupations, located in Egypt at the edge of the desert at the edge of the Nile valley near the village of Nazlet Khater. Most of the sites are associated with intermittent mining activities beginning 40,000 years ago. The most extensively reported of the eight are Nazlet Khater 2 (NK2), an early modern human burial dated by electron spin resonance to 38,000 years ago, and NK4, a chert quarry dated to the Upper Paleolithic of 30,000-33,000 RCYBP years ago (35,000-40,000 cal BP).
NK2: Upper Paleolithic Burial
NK2 is the purposeful burial of a subadult male in a supine position, found at the summit of a hill some 250 meters (825 feet) from the closest quarry. The skeleton is nearly complete, although the lower portion of his body is not as well-preserved as the upper. Electron spin resonance on tooth enamel dates this burial to 38,000 years BP, and some evidence directly associates this burial to the mining activities at NK4. Of particular importance is the well-preserved skull, which has morphological features suggesting a close relationship to European Upper Paleolithic skeletons, such as Pestera cu Oase in Romania.
Skeletal examination of the bones in the 1980s indicated that the man was not Neanderthal, but rather an early modern human who stood approximately 165 centimeters (65 inches) tall and had very strong arms. The examination also concluded that the man had sustained considerable damage to his vertebra throughout his life, suggesting to researchers that he had worked in the mines for most of his life.
At his right ear was placed a Nazlet Khater adze, similar to those used for Upper Paleolithic mining at NK4. Some scholars have argued that the adze was intrusive, rather than grave goods, although dates of the chert mining are coeval with the burial. The grave pit was cut some 60 cm (23 in) below the surface and the body was covered with several boulders, and infilled with aeolian sand.
NK2 is the oldest fully modern complete adult human identified in Northeast Africa to date. As an individual from the Upper Paleolithic, and given the relationship to Pestera cu Oase, the NK2 individual represents an important clue concerning the migration of humans out of Africa and into Europe.
NK4: Mining at Nazlet Khater
NK4 is an Upper Paleolithic quarry site, where people mined chert, the raw material for the production of a blade stone tool industry. Excavations identified several methods of extraction used to mine flint, including ditches, vertical shafts and underground galleries. Tools used to extract the ore were hartebeest and gazelle horn picks and bifacial lithic adzes (the Nazlet Khater type, one of which was discovered next to the NK2 burial). Hearths in the region as well as dispersed charcoal within the mine excavations produced radiocarbon dates ranging between 30,400-35,100 RCYBP.
Mining Evidence
The flint was mined from a relict Nile River gravel channel deposit, located at the base of some 1-2 meters (3-7 feet) of aeolian sand. Atop the gravel deposit is a 10 cm (4 in) thick layer of calcrete. Three mining efforts were identified and associated with the Upper Paleolithic occupation: trenches, vertical shafts and subterranean galleries. A trench measuring 9x2 m (30x7 ft) had been excavated 1.5 m (5 ft) into the wadi. Vertical shafts were dug down to the channel lag and widened out to bell shapes at the base. The layer of calcrete permitted the relatively safe excavation of short galleries leading outward from both the bell-shaped pits and the trench.
A living floor at NK4 yielded many bone fragments and a large assemblage of stone tools, cores, flakes and chips. The industry is distinctively a prismatic blade industry, with four reduction techniques identified based on platform shape and size. Debitage that could be attributed to Levallois technique were present in the stone assemblage, but represent only a tiny fraction of the lithic materials. The lithics have been linked typologically to Haua Fteah in Libya and Boker Tachtit in Israel.
Archaeology at Nazlet Khater
The eight sites of Nazlet Khater were excavated between the 1970s and 1980s by the Belgian Middle Egypt Prehistoric Project of Leuven University under the direction of P.M. Vermeersch. Additional research on the artifacts and human remains has continued since that time.
Sources
This glossary entry is a part of the About.com guide to the Upper Paleolithic, the Guide to Quarry Sites and the Dictionary of Archaeology.
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