The First Peoples of Oman: Palaeolithic Archaeology of the Nejd Plateau (The Archaeological Heritage of Oman). Cet article n’est pas disponible.The First Peoples of Oman: Palaeolithic Archaeology of the Nejd Plateau (The Archaeological Heritage of Oman)

In Dhofar, the southern Governorate of the Sultanate of Oman, the deep canyons cutting the Nejd plateau once flowed with perennial rivers, feeding wetland environments, forests, and grasslands across the now desiccated interior. The first peoples of Oman flourished along these waterways, drawn to the freshwater springs and abundant game, as well as the myriad chert outcrops with which to fashion their hunting implements and other tools. The landscapes of the Nejd Plateau are a natural museum of human prehistory, covered in carpets of chipped stone debris. The archaeological evidence presented in this work encompasses the cultural remains of over a million years of successive human occupations, from the Lower Palaeolithic to the Late Palaeolithic. Once considered an evolutionary backwater or merely a migratory way station, the archaeology of Dhofar requires a fundamental reconsideration of the role of Southern Arabia in the origin and dispersal of our species.

Jeffrey I. Rose, Research Scholar at the Ronin Institute, is specialized in the prehistory of North Africa and Southwest Asia. His research interests include modern human origins, stone tool technology and archaeogenetics. In recognition of his team's discoveries in Oman, in 2012 Dr. Rose was named National Geographic's Emerging Explorer. | Yemandu H. Hilbert, Associated Researcher at the Archeorient laboratory of French CNRS, has worked on the field across Eurasia and North Africa since 2005 and is specialized on the Late Paleolithic of Dhofar. His research interests include ethnography, prehistoric archaeology and physical paleoanthropology. | Anthony E. Marks, Conducted pioneering prehistoric research in the Nile Valley and southern Levant, producing seminal works on the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic periods in these regions. Since 2003, Prof. Marks has focused his research activities in the United Arab Emirates and Oman. | Vitaly I. Usik, Senior Researcher in the Ukraine National Academy of Sciences, is specialized in lithic technology, refitting and site survey and excavations. With more than four decades of fieldwork experience, he has carried out technological studies on a wide range of lithic assemblages from Northeast Africa, the Levant, Arabia and western Eurasia.