that some primitive hominids, most likely Australopithecus, were responsi- 

 ble for the bone accumulations and had a well-developed cultural life based 

 primarily upon the use and modification of bone. We know already that the 

 manufacture of such artefacts was probably well within the somatic capacity 

 of Australopithecus. No other single hypothesis can explain more than a 

 proportion of the above facts. Occam's razor might well lead us to accept 

 Dart's interpretation, if not in its full detail then in broad principle, as the 

 most likely single explanation of the otherwise almost inexplicable moun- 

 tains of bones at Makapansgat, with their selected, fractured, and patterned 

 characteristics (Tobias 1968c). 



It may, of course, legitimately be inquired whether it is necessary to 

 assume a st7igle explanation for the bone accumulations. Of course, it is not 

 necessary to do so. Undoubtedly, such factors as rodent and carnivore activi- 

 ties also may have played a part— but the nature of the bone accumulations 

 at Makapansgat is not such that the lion's share of the great bone concen- 

 trations there may readily be attributed to such factors. Water action, 

 colluvial hill-wash, and accidental factors cannot be excluded as additional 

 agencies. However, at Makapansgat. at any rate, the totality of evidence sum- 

 marized above seems to point to hominid activities as being the most im- 

 portant agency responsible. 



At one other site, Swartkrans, in the Transvaal, Brain (1968b, 1970) has 

 produced evidence suggesting that carnivore activities, especially that of 

 leopards, may have been responsible in the main for the accumulation of 

 hominid material there. It is an interesting fact that hominid specimens 

 occur at Swartkrans in greater numbers than at any other site; indeed, some 

 40 per cent of all the australopithecine and other early hominid material 

 thus far discovered has emanated from Swartkrans (Tobias 1971). These 

 special conditions may well demand a special explanation at that site, such 

 as Brain's leopard hypothesis. However, the leopard hypothesis has been 

 invoked to explain the presence there of such large numbers of hominid 

 remains— including one with what appear to be leopard tooth-marks— but not, 

 as I understand it, to explain the presence of bones in all other deposits. 

 The leopard hypothesis for the Swartkrans hominid remains does not 

 weaken the hominid hypothesis to explain most of the Makapansgat animal 

 a< cumulations. 



A preponderance of osteodontokeratic activities, such as are evidenced 

 at Makapansgat, need not have characterized all early hominid populations 

 of the Lower Pleistocene. The southern African australopithecines of the 



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