Abstract
The open-air site of Txina-Txina is located in western Mozambique, near the border of South Africa, in the Limpopo National Park, in the Gaza Province. The site lies at −23.894 S, 31.912 E on the bank of a narrow gorge of the Machampane River near the confluence with the Elephant River, in the Limpopo Basin. The site covers more than 7000 m2 and it is located on an alluvial fan at the intersection of the Machampane with the Chifati stream. The Txina-Txina site has a 6-m-long sequence including both MSA and LSA components on the top 2.5 m of the sequence. While the MSA may be dated before 50 thousand years ago, the LSA is dated to between c. 32 thousand years ago and the very recent Holocene, capped by an Iron Age occupation. The LSA has at least eight different archaeological units with thousands of lithic artifacts, some riverine gastropods, and large land snails, as well as ostrich eggshell fragments, including two beads.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (Grants PTDC/EPH -ARQ/4998/2012 and PTDC/EPHARQ/4168/2014), and National Geographic Society for grants # Waitt Grant – W373.15 and HJ-033R-17 for funding the research in Mozambique. Permits were issued by the Direcção Nacional do Património Cultural, Maputo.
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Bicho, N., Cascalheira, J., Haws, J., Gomes, A., Raja, M. (2023). Txina-Txina and the Later Stone Age of the Massingir Region, Mozambique. In: Beyin, A., Wright, D.K., Wilkins, J., Olszewski, D.I. (eds) Handbook of Pleistocene Archaeology of Africa . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-20290-2_55
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