Dactylopius coccus has been used in Mexico and Peru as a source of natural dyes since pre-Columbian times. A phylogenetic analysis of the genus Dactylopius, and the disjoint distribution of D. coccus, suggest that the origin of D. coccus is South America and was introduced into North America by sea routes.

In January 2001, a team of researchers from the University of Ulster (Northern Ireland) conducted an innovative maritime archaeology project on the East African coast in partnership with the British Institute in Eastern Africa and the National Museums of Kenya. Its focus was Mombasa Island on the southern Kenyan coast, a historical settlement and port for nearly 2000 years (Berg 1968; Sassoon 1980; 1982). The East African seaboard, stretching from Somalia in the north to Madagascar and Mozambique in the south, was culturally dynamic throughout the historical period. This area, traditionally known as the Swahili coast, is culturally defined as a maritime zone extending 2000 km from north to south, but reaching a mere 15 hi inland. The origins of ‘Swahili’ cultural identity originated during the middle of the 1st millennium AD, following consolidation of earlier farming and metalusing Bantu-speaking communities along the coast and emergence of a distinctive ‘maritime’ orientation and set of cultural traditions (eg Allen 1993; Chami 1998; Helm 2000; Horton & Middelton 2000). Previous research produced evidence of exploitation of marine resources for food and an early engagement in longdistance exchange networks, linking parts ofthis coast with the Classical world by at least the BC/AD transition.

Examination of marks on a bone from Blombos Cave reveals that they were intentionally engraved and there is evidence of bone working techniques at the site. Engraved designs have also been identified on pieces of ochre from Blombos Cave, suggesting such engraving was a symbolic act with symbolic meaning.

Direct dating, using the Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS) 14C method, of a wooden moai kavakava (anthropomorphic woodcarving) in the collection of the Royal Museums of Art and History in Brussels has given a date of about cal AD 1390–1480. As there are reasons to believe that this age not only regards the raw material but also the carving itself, preserved examples of Easter Island wood sculpture may be much older than previously assumed and possibly contemporaneous with the giant monolithic sculpture of the first half of the 2nd millennium AD.

Between midnight on 6 June (D-Day) and 30 June 1944, over 850,000 men landed on the invasion beachheads of Normandy, together with nearly 150,000 vehicles and 570,000 tons ofsupplies. Assembled in camps and transit areas over the preceding months, this force was dispatched from a string of sites along Britain's coastline between East Anglia and South Wales (Dobinson 1996: 2). The article reviews those sites in England involved in this embarkation. English Heritage's Monuments Protection Programme (MPP) aims to identify surviving sites and recommend appropriate protection for them.

The author looks at construction and subsequent use-pattern of round barrows in the Cheshire Basin. He argues that the use of natural mounds for burial during the Early Bronze Age may be the result of mistaken identity, indicating a forgetting of the past.

Sub-Saharan West Africa has remained largely a blank space on the world rock-art map, in spite of a steady trickle of reports during the past century on pictograph and petroglyph sites in the West African sahel and savanna belts. It seems that the nature of the rock art reported, predominantly ‘geometric’ and saurian motifs, and ‘stick figures’, as well as its apparent recent age, formed little incentive for in-depth studies of rock art in this region. From sub-Saharan Mali, for example, only two sites have been published to a satisfactory standard (Huysecom 1990; Huysecom et al. 1996). The richness of the region in rock art, as indicated by several authors (e.g. Griaule 1938; Huysecom & Mayor 1991/92; Togola et al. 1995), has been confirmed by on-going research on rock art in the Boucle du Baoulé region (map, FIGURE 5) in the southwest of the country (Kleinitz 2000). In three field seasons, 14 known and 38 newly identified rock-shelters and open-air sites with pictographs and peboglyphs have been recorded.

Archaeological evidence from the Chang Tang Reserve suggests that humans may have first colonized the Tibetan Plateau during the late Pleistocene. Blade, bladelet and microblade technologies are found as surface assemblages in a variety of contexts above 4500 m elevation. The lack of modern analogues for foraging populations in high-elevation environments brings about a reconsideration of the diversity and organization of Pleistocene hunter-gatherer adaptations.

The discovery of carbonized date stones in the United Arab Emirates has made a contribution to the dating of early date consumption in the Near East.

In 1990, about 30 km southwest of Dakhla oasis, the most remote settlement in Egypt’s Western Desert, a hieroglyphic rock inscription was discovered that turned out to be the first clear evidence of an Ancient Egyptian presence so far into the Sahara (Burkard 1997). The short text states that a higher official named Meri went out to meet (?) oasis dwellers. Details of translation, interpretation and palaeographic dating of the text are a matter of discussion among Egyptologists, but it clearly seems to be of Old or Early Middle Kingdom origin. The home of the ‘oasis dwellers’ can reasonably be inferred as lying further west or southwest. However, the nearest places with permanent water in these directions are the Kufra Oasis in Libya and the wells of Djebel Uweinat, which lie, respectively, some 600 km and 500 lan away. How was it possible to master such distances under the then already prevailing hyperarid conditions by the only available means of transportation, a train of donkeys that have to drink at least every three days?

Extensive radiocarbon data are examined, including results from short-lived samples contemporary with use-contexts. An absolute date range for the main Late Cypriot IIC period on Cyprus, from c. 1340–1315 BC to c. 1200 BC, is proposed.

While palaeobotanical remains provide clear evidence for the exploitation of the date at various locations in Egypt and Nubia, it is the detection amongst lipid residues in closed form vessels of fatty acid distributions dominated by diagnostic short-chain fatty acids, i.e. C12:0 and C14:0′ that provides the first direct evidence for the processing of palm fruit in pottery vessels.

Rose granite was a favoured, but difficult, stone to work in ancient Egypt. Recent sawing, drilling and cutting tests of the granite in Aswan suggest how exacting were those tasks for craftworkers.

The Haubi Basin, situated in the Irangi Hills of Kondoa District, Dodoma Region, Tanzania (FIGURE 1), exhibits some of the most extreme examples of erosion and associated sedimentation in the region (Christiansson 1981; Payton et al. 1992) (FIGLIRE 2). The severity of the problem, with its consequent loss of productive land, has been known since the beginning of the 20th century (Kannenberg 1900; Obst 1915). Recognition of the extent and severity of the issues encouraged the British colonial government to introduce a variety of measures aimed at soil conservation in the 1930s (Fosbrooke 1950). These included the construction of check-dams, contour bunds and contour planting with sisal. After independence, a second programme of soil conservation measures was launched. These were initially similar to those employed under colonialism, but later included de-stocking, resulting in the removal of some 90,000 livestock from the most severely eroded areas. As in the colonial period, recent overexploitation of land resources by local populations was regarded as the primary explanation for the continuing soil erosion.

Where is rock-art study heading? The author analyses the current trends and proposes a landscape-based, gender-sensitive approach for future work.

The remains of pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum) dating to 3460±200 and 2960±370 BP have been recovered at the archaeological site of Birimi, northern Ghana, associated with the Kintampo cultural complex. This finding represents the earliest known occurrence of pearl millet in sub-Saharan Africa. Results indicate that Kintampo peoples developed effective subsistence adaptations to savannas as well as tropical forest habitats.

This paper reports the first chronometric study of the ‘moats’ of the abundant mounded Iron Age sites of northeast Thailand. Here AMS 14C dates and TL dates are reported which indicate that the moats date from a short period in the Mid to Late Iron Age, before being infilled. The dates also contain preliminary evidence for the chronology of landscape change, which is critical to the understanding of the Iron Age occupation of this region.

Many infrastructural development projects are now being carried out in Cameroon (e.g. road building, oil pipeline construction, and urban renewal). At present, no specific data base exists to determine the current and potential extent of damage to archaeological and historical sites. To redress this, we believe that there is an urgent need to make impact assessments and mitigation work a mandatory precondition of development approval for entrepreneurs and public works professionals operating in the country.

In situ preservation is a complex and dynamic process, which requires an understanding of the nature and scale of the material to be preserved, an understanding of the context of the site in terms of managerial needs and a programme of scientific monitoring of changes within the burial environment. The example of a rural archaeological landscape in northeast England, which is undergoing a programme of hydrological management, is considered.

The use of a wide range of narcotic drugs in antiquity has been widely documented, although archaeologists have sometimes been too credulous of apparently scientific data, and have failed to appreciate the post-excavation histories of artefacts, including mummies. This paper examines the discovery of tobacco in the mummy of Rameses II, provides an alternative model for its origin, as a 19th-century insecticide used in conservation, and throws doubt upon the evidence for both cannabis and cocaine in ancient Egypt.