■Jfv 



CMS 



Figure 36: Oblique dorsal view of an antelope metacarpal with a triangular 

 flake of bone wedged in position in the deep cleft between the 2 condyles 

 of the bone. 



12. Another material readily at hand— stalactite and stalagmite— has been 

 found broken off in the deposit, and some fragments were further fractured 

 transversely and longitudinally. Where is the carnivore that indulges in such 

 behavior? 



It may well be inquired why comparable masses of what Dart calls 

 osteodontokeratic objects have not been reported from Taung or Sterkfon- 

 tein, especially as there are numbers of fractured baboon crania at both sites. 

 At neither site can it be said that more than a fraction of the breccia has 

 been thoroughly searched for broken bone fragments other than taxonomi- 

 cally identifiable parts. Yet, Robinson has described a selectively polished 

 bone implement from Sterkfontein that, after a careful analysis for pos- 

 sible alternative causal agencies, he concludes "can only be explained as a 

 by-product of intelligent hominid behaviour" (1959, p. 585). Similarly, 

 L. S. B. Leakey (i960) has recorded "a genuine bone tool" from the site 

 F.L.K.N.N.I. (the type site of Homo habilis) in Olduvai Gorge. And his wife, 

 M. D. Leakey (1967), has recorded "a few bone fragments with evidence of 

 utilization" at sites of the "Oldowan Culture" in the lower part of the 

 Olduvai sequence. From M.N.K. and other sites in the middle and upper 

 parts of Bed II, she has described a number of bones "which had been arti- 

 ficially shaped and subsequently utilized" (M. D. Leakey 1967, p. 440). 



Dart's standpoint may be restated thus: the simplest hypothesis that at 

 once explains all the above sets of facts about the Makapansgat bones is 



131 l< 



