Table1_Coastal adaptations on the eastern seaboard of South Africa during the Pleistocene and Holocene? Current evidence and future perspectives from archaeology and marine geology.DOCX

The use of marine resources and the settlement of coastal settlements may have influenced the bio-cultural evolution and dispersal of Pleistocene Homo sapiens in Africa. In order to test such scenarios, however, we require evidence for these behaviours deriving from an expanded spatio-temporal archaeological record. The Stone Age of South Africa documents the richest and longest record of coastal adaptations. In contrast to abundant evidence of coastal sites on the western and southern seaboard, the eastern Indian Ocean coast has not played a role in recent discussions. Considering the important and well-known Middle and Later Stone Age (MSA/LSA) record from inland sites of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), this region may be an underappreciated area for further study. Here we provide a systematic overview of marine resource use and the settlement of coastal landscapes during the Late Pleistocene and Holocene in KZN. For the first time, we contextualize these archaeological findings with a review and new data on the changing marine and coastal geomorphology in the context of GIS modelling and offshore marine geophysical investigations. Our review finds evidence for long-term dietary and non-dietary use of marine resources during the MSA and LSA from a few stratified sites, with many more surface occurrences particularly for the MSA along the modern KZN coastline indicating human habitation. Comparisons to other areas of South Africa, GIS modelling and geological considerations suggest that current data on the eastern seaboard are not reflective of the original extent and nature of the consumption of marine foods and settlement of coastal landscapes. By contextualizing the biased and patchy MSA and LSA record with results on the dynamic marine and coastal geomorphology of KZN, we develop productive lines of future studies to assess open questions on potential coastal adaptations in this region. These research strategies include the identification of areas with high potential for finding new sites within a 10 km transect along the current coastline as well as dedicated off-shore projects including underwater archaeology aided by new marine geological work in the southwest Indian Ocean.

海洋资源的利用与沿海定居点的形成可能对非洲更新世智人（Homo sapiens）的生物文化演化和扩散产生了影响。然而，为了验证此类情景，我们需要从扩展的时空考古记录中获取这些行为的相关证据。南非的旧石器时代记录了最为丰富和悠久的沿海适应记录。与西部和南部海沿岸丰富的沿海遗址证据形成对比，印度洋东海岸并未在近期讨论中占据一席之地。考虑到夸祖鲁纳塔尔（KwaZulu-Natal，简称KZN）内陆遗址中已知的且广为人知的中间和晚期旧石器时代（MSA/LSA）记录的重要性，这一区域可能尚未得到充分的研究重视。在此，我们对KZN地区晚更新世至全新世期间的海洋资源利用与沿海景观的定居进行了系统概述。首次，我们将这些考古发现与GIS建模和近海海洋地球物理调查背景下的海洋和沿海地貌变化的新数据相结合。我们的研究表明，在MSA和LSA时期，从少数分层遗址中发现了对海洋资源长期饮食及非饮食用途的证据，尤其是在现代KZN海岸线沿线的MSA时期，地表出现的遗址数量更多，这表明了人类居住的迹象。与南非其他地区的比较、GIS建模和地质考量表明，目前关于东海岸的数据并不反映海洋食物消费及沿海景观定居的原有范围和性质。通过将偏颇且零散的MSA和LSA记录与KZN动态海洋和沿海地貌变化的结果相结合，我们构建了富有成效的未来研究方向，以评估该地区潜在沿海适应性的开放性问题。这些研究策略包括在当前海岸线10公里范围内识别具有高发现新遗址潜力的区域，以及包括由西南印度洋新的海洋地质工作辅助的水下考古在内的专门近海项目。