Strong women in the cradle of humanity
Unique research in Tanzania, in areas considered to be the cradle of humankind, will be conducted by archaeologists from the University of Wrocław and the Polish Academy of Sciences. Among them is our researcher prof. Marta Osypińska from the Institute of Archaeology of the University of Wrocław: “It was in the East African savannas, and thanks to our relations with that nature and animals, that we acquired the traits that determined the ultimate success of our species in expanding across the globe” she says.
Why Tanzania?
Prof. Marta Osypińska from the Institute of Archaeology, University of Wrocław:
It is both a combination of random events and the fulfilment of professional and personal dreams. Last year we attended the 16th PanAfrican Archaeological Association Congress, which this time was held in Zanzibar. This is the most important meeting of archaeologists working in Africa and is held every four years in a different country. It was initiated back in the 1960s by Louis Leakey. This time it was actually Tanzania.
We decided to take the opportunity to fly from the fabulous island of Zanzibar to the mainland after the congress, to see the most emblematic sites – both for archaeology, palaeoanthropology and zoology. The first destination was PN Gombe on Lake Tanganyika, a place where, for 60 years, continuous research on primates, mainly chimpanzee families, has been carried out on the initiative and with the continuous help of Jane Goodal. We not only had the opportunity to spend a few days with zoologists observing these magnificent animals, but also to see the osteological archive where all the chimpanzee skeletons from the park are collected.
Zoologists and archaeologists together?
Yes. Zoologists were very interested in collaborating and taking advantage of the opportunities offered by archaeozoology in ‘reading from bones’. They only deal with living animals and didn’t realise how much you can read about animal life from the skeletons themselves. We continue to stay in touch. We also visited the famous Ujiji – the place where Henry Stanley found Dr David Livingstone. Everyone knows the famous phrase said when the two English gentlemen met and greeted each other after months of searching in the African interiors with the words: “Dr Livingstone I presume?”.
And then you flew north….
… to the ‘cradle of mankind’ in the GreatRift Valley, where the Olduvai Gorge is located in the Ngorongoro PN area.
What surprised you in Tanzania?
While the congress was still in progress, we found ourselves, almost by chance, at an extremely momentous event, especially for Tanzanian scientists and organisers of an event, which turned out to be a formal meeting with the Vice President of Tanzania, the President of Zanzibar and the authorities of Tanzania’s largest university, the University of Dar es-Salaam. We were amazed that both high-level politicians and the rector or dean from the Collage of Humanities invited scientists from Europe and called for initiation of research projects in Tanzania. This seemed to be more than a courtesy, although we were very surprised, given the importance of the discoveries from Tanzania to world science and our knowledge of human evolution. During an intensive search, we found, also to our surprise, that in fact very few foreign archaeological projects are currently being carried out in Tanzania, especially if we consider the turnout of such research by European scientists in, for example, the Nile Valley.
What kind of research is being conducted there?
In Tanzania, research is currently carried out mainly in Olduvai, where a Spanish mission has been working for decades, and periodically also the American one. In Zanzibar, researchers from the UK are involved in research episodically. Other expeditions tend to be limited to one-year, small-scale projects by archaeologists from South Africa or France. For years, no new data from the area has been added to the international scientific debate, especially in terms of the periods that interest us most scientifically – the Middle Stone Age, i.e. the oldest history of Homo sapiens, and the early Holocene pastoral communities and the spread of Cattle Centred Behaviour cultures in Africa. The visit to Olduvai and the many hours of discussions with the manager of this large complex, as well as the subsequent exchange of emails with the dean and director of the Department of Archaeology at the Collage of Humanities, University of Dar es-Salaam, confirmed our observations and inspired the idea of initiating a future project in this fascinating and extremely important area in the history of mankind – the East African savannahs.
Especially since the civil war broke out in the spring in Sudan, where you were conducting research…
Yes, and it has become clear to us that this is a conflict that will destabilise the situation for years to come in this country with which we have linked our careers and research for 20 years. The war would make it impossible for us to complete the project we were currently working on. And the idea to use the remaining funds to initiate research in Tanzania emerged. To our good fortune, research into the prehistory of Africa, the history of the human-animal relationship and the cognitive evolution of us humans just before we left Africa provides such, scientifically sound opportunities.
For some time now, we have been thinking about extending our studies of early human history in Africa beyond Sudan. This included, for example, Chad, where our German colleagues are working. We wanted to broaden our scientific perspective, and to increase the still very poor state of our knowledge of the prehistory of Africa, which is a key continent for us humans. After our return from the congress, in the autumn of last year, we made contact with three leading prehistoric researchers at the University of Dar es-Salaam. From spring onwards, our discussions became more concrete, and in September we flew to Tanzania to meet face-to-face, to see the monuments from the sites proposed for our research, and to visit in person the extraordinary site we had chosen together for our future scientific projects – the Serengeti National Park.
What will you be looking for there? What do you expect to find?
Since the great discoveries in palaeoanthropology made in Tanzania by Louis and Mary Leakey (although in Tanzania it is Mary who is considered the main person in this team) in the 1960s and 1980s, actually all archaeology in Tanzania has been dominated by the subject of hominids and the oldest history of our species. Slightly younger periods arouse much less, not to say negligible, interest among researchers. It is the MSA, pastoral cultures and modern history (here mainly Swahili period research in Zanzibar and on the Indian Ocean coast). There are vast regions of this extremely interesting country about which we know practically nothing in terms of prehistory and archaeology. Among them, to our great surprise, is the vast Serengeti area, adjacent to the Rift Valley and only a few dozen kilometres from Olduvai. In the late 1970s, the American researcher Prof. J. Bower conducted the National Geographic-funded ‘Serengeti Survey’ project there. However, he never published any maps of the sites or a precise inventory of them. He also undertook a survey of a Late Pleistocene (Middle Stone Age and Late Stone Age) site on the Loiyangalani River. From the two articles that have appeared as a result of this work, we know that there are numerous archaeological sites in the Serengeti, very rich in both stone artefacts and mineralised bone. Remarkably, we currently have only one, hand-drawn at the time of the American research, map. We were also able to establish that the river the American mission was working on is not called Loiyangalani (this one is in the Masai Mara in Kenya) but Mbalabete. Prof. Bower resumed work at this site in 2005. Polish scientist prof. Michał Kobusiewicz of IAE PAN in Poznań, in a way our mentor and teacher, also participated in the excavations. Sporadic, exploratory work was undertaken in the park about 20 years ago by another participant in J. Bower’s mission – Prof. Audax Mabula from Dar es-Salaam. During a meeting with the professor a month ago, we learned that indeed the Serengeti abounds in perfectly preserved and rich prehistoric sites and there is absolutely no map to document or describe them. Nevertheless, the professor expressed great willingness to come with us and help find and document them.
What do you expect there?
Absolutely everything. The artefacts we have looked at during our visits to the university do indeed indicate an excellent state of preservation and a great wealth of sites. Our scientific ‘dream’ is to be able to find sites analogous or similar to those we studied in the Nile Valley (Affad). Sites that would allow us to learn about man in his savannah ‘motherland/refugium’, at the stage of recent evolution. It was in the terrain of the East African savannas, in our relations with this nature and animals, that we acquired the traits that determined the ultimate success of our species in expanding across the globe. It was the adaptive plasticity to changing conditions, the free ability to use fire to process meat, the development of hunting – both its model and techniques, the organisation of camps, the ‘context’ of life and even body decoration and what we would call ‘art’ or culture. In the Serengeti, for example, beads made from ostrich eggs were discovered tens of thousands of years ago! But let us remember that we will be working in the immediate vicinity of the “cradle of man”. It is possible that we will come across sites from the Lower Palaeolithic period, millions of years ago. It is not also excluded that we will find hominid remains. We can also expect younger – Holocene hunter-gatherers, pastoralists… I think it is not an exaggeration to say that we can expect to find the whole of African prehistory “in abundance”…
Who will participate in the research?
Our research is intended to initiate future large-scale scientific collaboration between Polish and Tanzanian researchers. Therefore, acting in the spirit of sustainable and engaged archaeology, we plan to compose a team consisting of Polish and Tanzanian researchers in comparable proportions. Next year’s surface survey (Serengeti Survey Project) will involve three archaeologists-prahistorians (representing Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology of the Polish Academy of Sciences, and the University of Dar es-Salaam), two archaeozoologists (myself as project coordinator representing the University of Wrocław, and a colleague from the University of Dar es-Salaam), a drone operator and a surveyor from Poland.
When we manage to obtain a grant for excavation research, for which we are already applying, the team will be correspondingly larger, with both scientists and students. However, given the very difficult logistical side of working in such a unique place as the largest protected area in the world, our teams will never be very large. We estimate that the optimal number of people in the mission is around 10 scientists.
Will you be using modern technology?
Using the fullest possible spectrum of modern techniques and technologies currently available to science in archaeological research is one of our main goals. The research in the Serengeti will also be a kind of ‘testing ground’ for a variety of techniques, analyses, advanced research – whether in terms of archaeological documentation, multidisciplinary laboratory analyses, or the mapping of sites themselves in a topographical and environmental context (GIS), using satellite imagery, drones, GPS. We want to test which techniques and methods work in this specific region, the state of preservation, geological and ecological realities, and which are unlikely to work here. We also have some experience in this area from Sudan, where we have been able to verify the operation and limitations of some previous methods used unquestioningly in archeology.
When do you leave?
We are still negotiating dates with colleagues in Tanzania. Like me, they are both researchers and didacticians, so they have to take into account ‘school’ field practices, exam dates etc. The most likely date is August-September 2024, the end of the dry season when vegetation is at its poorest, which is important for surface research. This is also the time when giant herds of ruminants, e.g. wildebeest and zebra, followed by families of carnivores, give a little more ‘space’ just getting ready to migrate south. We now have a few months to sort out all the paperwork and logistical organisation of the research.
This is a logistically demanding undertaking…
Oh yes, very much so. I think this is one of the reasons why the Serengeti area is so poorly recognised archaeologically – to our scientific luck! The journey alone from the only major town of Arusha, which lies at the foot of Mont Meru and Kilimanjaro, to the park is very exhausting, taking up a whole day’s driving, mainly on the terrible, at times dangerously winding volcanic slopes, dirt road within the Ngorongoro Park. There is, of course, no permanent infrastructure in the Serengeti (not counting the old zoological base and Seronera – an airstrip for small aircraft). In fact, everything has to be brought in. You live in tents. The camps cannot be fenced off, so at night you can hear the lush Serengeti life going on right next to your head. You can only leave your tent after dusk when assisted by a ranger called by walkie-talkie. You can only travel through the park by car. We will also have to work under the ‘protection’ of rangers. You must not stray more than a few dozen metres from the car. The car door must always be wide open and the key in the ignition. We know from Professor Mabuli’s stories that all earthworks attract a lot of interest from animals, especially lions. It is also important to remember the smaller but no less dangerous inhabitants of the Serengeti: malaria-carrying mosquitoes and tse-tse flies. Here, too, great care must be taken to protect the body, both through suitable repellents and clothing. However, we are not afraid of these challenges and working conditions ‘in the wilderness’. They are rather a motivation for us. We have long experience, although quite different, of organising the life and work of missions in the no less demanding desert Sudan. We have occasionally worked under extremely difficult logistical conditions, such as during the archaeological rescue operation in the area of the Fourth Cataract, which preceded the construction of the Nile Dam. The opportunity to conduct research in such a unique place as the Serengeti motivates and inspires us greatly.
This is a very dangerous place!
From an archaeologist’s point of view, it seems to be probably one of the most dangerous places you can imagine. There are, of course, different forms of danger that we come across in our work – myself or my colleagues – whether in Mongolia, Peru or Egypt. In the Serengeti, however, we may have to deal with danger in the literal sense of the word. This year’s visit made us realise the enormity of the challenge we face. The richest wildlife on our planet that we encounter in the Serengeti inspires awe, but also boundless admiration. Just watching the stands by the Mbalagete River, one could feel a thrill of apprehension and excitement as one listened to the splashing and roaring of a herd of hippos bathing nearby. It is also with some nervousness, that you watch every bush or clump of trees you pass. The park is home not only to numerous lion families, but also to hyenas and leopards… In addition to predators, it is best to avoid close contact with elephants or rhinos. A certain challenge for us may be to establish good relations with … zoologists, especially those caring specifically for black rhinos. This is an extremely endangered species. The individuals in the park are constantly monitored by a team from a German zoological foundation. In case of overly insistent tourists disturbing any of the rhinos, or cars blocking the free passage of any of the animals, a car with uniformed and firm gentlemen appears almost immediately to intervene. The location of specific individuals is kept secret. When we asked about the possibility of using, for example, a surveying drone, Professor Mabula indicated that the only objections might be raised by ‘rhino’ zoologists, who might fear ‘unauthorised’ tracking of these animals. So the challenges and risks can be very diverse, although the professional approach of our colleagues in Dar es-Salam, and their all-round support, make us very optimistic about the possibility of implementing our plans.
What do you personally associate Tanzania with?
It appears to me as a country of strong women. The head of state is President Samia Suluhu. There are many women in university authorities. Even a simple conversation with a Tanzanian woman working in a shop shows their extraordinary strength of character, resourcefulness and kindness. These are women who inspire respect and admiration. An iconic researcher and, in a way, the ‘mother of archaeology’ in the region is Mary Leakey. Numerous museum exhibitions tell the story of her life and research. In Olduvai, there is a museum dedicated solely to her life – the camp where she lived during her research in the gorge and nearby Laetoli. The famous primatologist Jane Goodal (whom, to our disappointment, we missed in Gombe by just two days), and who is now active in the field of child welfare in Tanzania in addition to her animal and environmental foundations must be mentioned as well. She has previously worked closely with Luois Leakey combining knowledge of primates with palaeoanthropology. After her visit to Gombe, I think there is scope to continue such a nomen omen archaeo-zoological collaboration. To put it half-jokingly: I think that a new archaeological project, pioneering in a way, carried out in the Serengeti under the direction of a female archaeozoologist and archaeologist from the University of Wrocław, will be a good ‘fit’ for Tanzania.
Compiled by Katarzyna Górowicz-Maćkiewicz
Translated by Martyna Mielczarek (student of English Studies at the University of Wrocław) as part of the translation practice.
