MEGALITHS, MOBILITY, AND LANDSCAPE: LITHIC TECHNOLOGY AND STRONTIUM ISOTOPE EVIDENCE FROM GEDEO AND MENZ, ETHIOPIA

Addisalem Melesse Sugamo

This dissertation examines the interrelationship between lithic technology and human mobility within megalithic landscapes in Late Holocene Ethiopia, with a focus on the Gedeo Zone in southern Ethiopia and the Menz region in northern Ethiopia. Although Ethiopian megalithic monuments are prominent features of the archaeological record, their associated technological systems and the mobility patterns of the communities that constructed them remain poorly understood. This study addresses this gap by employing an integrated analytical framework that combines lithic assemblage analysis with strontium isotope (⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr) data, interpreted within a landscape archaeology perspective.Lithic assemblages of Gedeo are systematically analyzed to reconstruct technological organization, raw material procurement, and patterns of site use. The assemblages are dominated by obsidian likely obtained through long-distance exchange and consist largely of debitage, blades, scrapers, and cores, indicating on-site tool production and maintenance. Variability in tool types and their spatial distribution suggests temporal and functional differentiation across sites, possibly reflecting specialized or ritual activities associated with stele monuments. To assess mobility, strontium isotope analyses are conducted on human remains from Tuto Fela in Gedeo and from the Menz sites of Amba Gabriel, Meshala Maryam, and Tatar Gur. At Tuto Fela, slight isotopic variation among individuals suggests limited residential mobility, with one or two individuals potentially originating from nearby areas with slightly different isotopic signatures. At Tatar Gur, individuals exhibit lower and more variable isotope ratios, forming two distinct groupings, these differences could result from dietary variation linked to ecology of the area. However, the absence of well-defined bioavailable strontium baseline data for the Menz region remains a significant limitation in interpreting these results. This research contributes baseline data for Ethiopian archaeology and offers a holistic, interdisciplinary perspective on how Late Holocene communities organized technology, navigated landscapes, and expressed social memory and territoriality through megalithic traditions.

MEGALITHS, MOBILITY, AND LANDSCAPE: LITHIC TECHNOLOGY AND STRONTIUM ISOTOPE EVIDENCE FROM GEDEO AND MENZ, ETHIOPIA

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