The engraved bone drew international attention as soon as it was described by J. de Heinzelin in 1957. Its uniqueness, as well as its geographical and chronological position, were astonishing.
Ishango is located on the top of a fossil terrace of the Semliki River, at the mouth of Lake Edward/Rutanzige, in the Democratic Republic of Congo. There were several prehistoric occupations from 20,000 till 5000 BC, when the volcano Katwe erupted. The different levels of human occupation are characterised either by a great amount of small‐sized tools in a translucent white quartz, but most of all by numerous bone harpoons. Those latter evolved from a one‐barbed sided to a two‐barbed sided type. The settlement of Ishango would illustrate an old step of this harpoon production, whose pattern would have been widespread from the Great Lakes region towards Western Africa and the North in Sudan and Egypt. Rainfall was increasing during this time, so that the way of life was more devoted to fishing....
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Brooks, A. S. and C. Smith. Ishango Revisited: New Age Determinations and Cultural Interpretations. The African Archaeological Review 5 (1987): 65–78.
de Heinzelin J. Ishango. Scientific American, 206.6 (1962): 105–16.
‐‐‐. Les Fouilles d'Ishango. Bruxelles: Institut des Parcs nationaux du Congo belge, 1957.
Marshack, A. The Mesolithic Bone: Ishango. The Roots of Civilization. Ed. Alexander Marshack. New York: McGrew‐Hill Book Company, 1972: 27–32.
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Hauzeur, A. (2008). Ishango Bone. In: Selin, H. (eds) Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-4425-0_9747
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