Small mammal utilization by Middle Stone Age humans at Die Kelders Cave 1 and Pinnacle Point Site 5-6, Western Cape Province, South Africa Aaron Armstrong Department of Anthropology, University of Minnesota, 395 Humphrey Center, 30119th Ave. South, Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA article info Article history: Received 4 March 2016 Accepted 22 September 2016 Keywords: Die Kelders Cave 1 Pinnacle Point Site 5-6 Middle Stone Age Modern human behavior Small mammal utilization Taphonomy abstract Reported here are the results of a taphonomic analysis of the small mammals (between 0.75 kg and 4.5 kg adult body weight) and size 1 bovids (20 kg adult body weight) from the Middle Stone Age (MSA) sites of Die Kelders Cave 1 (DK1) and Pinnacle Point Site 5-6 (PP5-6), Western Cape Province, South Africa. This study provides a comprehensive taphonomic analysis of MSA small mammals with a focus on discerning the role of humans in their accumulation and the implications for human behavioral adaptations. Based on comparisons with control assemblages of known accumulation, it is evident that humans accumulated many of the Cape dune mole-rats, hares, and size 1 bovids at DK1. The patterning of cut-marked and burned mole-rat remains at DK1 provides evidence in the MSA for the systematic uti- lization of small mammals for their skins and as a protein source. Unlike DK1, small mammals and size 1 bovids constitute only a small portion of the PP5-6 mammals and they exhibit little evidence of human accumulation. Nocturnal and diurnal raptors accumulated most of the small fauna at PP5-6. The nominal presence of small mammals in the PP5-6 fauna is atypical of MSA sites in the Cape Floristic Region, where they are abundant and often constitute large portions of MSA archaeofaunas. DK1 humans maximized the environmental yield by exploiting low-quality resources, a strategy employed possibly in response to localized environmental conditions and to greater human population densities. In comparison, the MIS5- 4 humans at PP5-6 did not exploit small mammals and instead focused on higher-quality resources like shellfish and large ungulates. Humans and predators accumulated few small mammals at PP5-6, sug- gesting that these taxa may have been less abundant near the site and/or that humans could afford to concentrate on high-quality resources, perhaps because of a higher-yield local environment. This study suggests that an adaptive response to the environmental conditions of MIS4 was to maximize the resource yield of local habitats to include lower-quality resources when necessary. The incorporation of these resources in the face of changing environmental and perhaps population pressures is a subsistence adaptation that played a crucial role in the population stability and expansion evidenced by the number of sites in the Cape dating to MIS4. © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction There is general agreement that the African Middle Stone Age (MSA) began by ca. 285,000 years ago (Tryon and McBrearty, 2002, 2006) and persisted until ca. 30,000 years ago (Deacon and Deacon, 1999; McBrearty and Tryon, 2005; Tryon and McBrearty, 2006). Paleoanthropological and archaeological investigations of this time period are frequently rooted in questions concerning the origins of modern human behavior. Throughout Africa, archaeological sequences dating to the last half of the MSA have produced evi- dence for behavioral characteristics thought to be central to the expansion of modern humans out of Africa. There is consensus that these behaviors include the creation and use of symbols (Henshilwood et al., 2002, 2009, 2011; d'Errico et al., 2005, 2012; Texier et al., 2010), technological and social complexity (Yellen and Brooks, 1995; Wurz, 1999, 2012, 2013; Brown et al., 2009, 2012; Wilkins et al., 2012), and adaptable foraging strategies and use of landscapes (Marean et al., 2007; McCall and Thomas, 2012; Nash et al., 2013; Marean, 2014; Thompson and Henshilwood, 2014a). E-mail address: armst147@umn.edu. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Human Evolution journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jhevol http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhevol.2016.09.010 0047-2484/© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Journal of Human Evolution 101 (2016) 17e44