Sedentism in prehistoric North Africa

http://tinyurl.com/mrs8c (journalsonline.tandf.co.uk)

The latest issue of World Archaeology (Volume 38, Number 2, June 2006) focuses on sedentism, and contains one article relevant to Egyptian prehistory: Semi-permanent foragers in semi-arid environments of North Africa by Elena A. A. Garcea: "Early Holocene foragers in North Africa provide unique responses to adaptational patterns of non-agricultural societies and they can offer intriguing answers to questions regarding relationships between sedentism, economy and sociocultural complexity. Three points are of major relevance for understanding late foragers in North Africa: first, fishing, sustained by reduced mobility, was a common practice at sites located along perennial rivers, such as the Nile, or seasonal watercourses (wadis); second, the successive shift to a food-producing economy implied the acquisition of nomadic pastoralism; third, agriculture has never been a feasible economic practice in desert and peri-desert environments."

The full paper can be purchased online, but the abstract is free of charge at the above address.