Human cognitive evolution, stone age archaeology and bridging theory from a bow hunter’s perspective

Abstract: Recognising elements of a ‘modern’ mind, or complex cognition, in Stone Age archaeology is difficult and often disputed. A key question is whether, and in which way Homo sapiens thinking differs from that of other Homo species/sub-species. We argue that if the question of whether the modern mind is different from that of our ancestors or other members of the Homo family is to be fully explored, some focus should fall on technologies and behaviours unique to H. sapiens. Here we hypothesise about one such techno-behaviour, i.e., bow hunting (Fig. 1). This is different from, for example, symbolic behaviour for which there is also evidence amongst the Neanderthals (Mellars 2010). Other technologies and their associated behavioural repertoires, such as the heat treatment of rocks to improve knapping properties and hunting with snares represent similar opportunities to explore the cognition of early H. sapiens (Wadley 2010, 2013)