68,000–20,000 BCE: (The Later Stone Age Toolkit as the Marker of Fully Modern Human Expansion — Small Stone Blades and Points, Finely Shaped Bone Points, and…

68,000–20,000 BCE: (The Later Stone Age Toolkit as the Marker of Fully Modern Human Expansion — Small Stone Blades and Points, Finely Shaped Bone Points, and Composite Projectile Weaponry Defining the Emergence of the Later Stone Age in Eastern Africa, the Appearance of This Toolkit in the Archaeology of Regions Outside Africa Identifying the Spread of the Upper Paleolithic, the Successively Wider Expansion of These Tools and Toolmaking Advances Serving as Definitive Identifiers of the Stage-by-Stage Advance of Fully Modern Ancestors Outward from Eastern Africa to the Rest of the Globe): It is the invention of these kinds of small stone blades and points, finely shaped bone points, and composite projectile weaponry that defines the emergence of the Later Stone Age in our common eastern African homeland. It is the appearance of this kind of toolkit in the archaeology that identifies the spread out of Africa of the Upper Paleolithic versions of those industries — “Upper Paleolithic” being what the Later Stone Age is called in the archaeology of the lands outside of our home continent. The successively wider expansion in subsequent millennia of these particular kinds of tools and toolmaking advances to new regions of the world, both within Africa and outside it, serve as the definitive identifiers of the stage-by-stage advance of our fully modern ancestors outward from eastern Africa to the rest of the globe. The toolkit is the signature. Wherever in the world archaeologists find the Later Stone Age / Upper Paleolithic assemblage — microliths, bone points, composite weapons — they are finding the footprint of eastern African peoples moving into new territory. The Upper Paleolithic is not a European phenomenon. It is an African export, carried outward by African peoples who brought with them the tools, the language capacities, the social structures, and the cognitive abilities that would allow them to adapt to every environment on earth. Europe did not invent the Upper Paleolithic. Europe received it from Africa, and the terminology that gives Europe pride of naming — “Upper Paleolithic” rather than “Later Stone Age” — is itself one more artifact of the infrastructure of erasure that has obscured Africa’s foundational role in the human story.