ABSTRACT
Anthropological interest in peoples that subsist solely on hunted and foraged foodstuffs has long been heightened by the notion that these people are in some sense survivors from the primitive condition of all mankind. Darwinian evolutionary theory created an initial phase of uncritical exuberance among prehistorians and anthropologists. This chapter illustrates some of the features of archeological evidence concerning Pleistocene hunters. It provides examples of the use of comparative data in archeological inference. The chapter then indicates some of the archeologist's special requirements for ethnographic data of various kinds not generally recorded. The example presented is based on the archeological evidence stratified in a 'Middle Pleistocene' sedimentary formation at Olorgesailie in Kenya. No traces of vegetable foods have survived on any site at Olorgesailie excavated to date. There is no direct evidence regarding the nature of hunting methods employed by Acheulean men at Olorgesailie.
