Oldowan Culture

Grant S. McCall

The Oldowan is the earliest of the Lower Paleolithic or Early Stone Age typological “cultures.” At present, the earliest Oldowan sites date from about 2.6 my and come from Gona, in the Afar region of Ethiopia. The Oldowan industry terminates at about 1.6 my, which coincides with the beginning of the Acheulean. The Developed Oldowan, which is concurrent with the Acheulean industry but lacks the characteristic bifaces, continues for several hundred thousand years after the end of Oldowan. However, numerous researchers do not consider the Developed Oldowan separate from the Acheulean industry. In the strictest sense, the Oldowan culture is restricted to Africa, although stone tool assemblages predating the Acheulean have been found in other parts of the Old World recently. The Oldowan culture is named for the type-site of Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania. Olduvai was first investigated by Heinrich Reck during the early 1910s, establishing the basic stratigraphic framework ...

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