Kesem-Kebena-Dulecha study area, Ethiopia

In 1988 and 1989, the Paleoanthropological Inventory of Ethiopia (PIE) field expedition discovered numerous localities of prehistoric significance across Ethiopia (WoldeGabriel et al., 1992). One of the regions surveyed by the Inventory team was the Dulecha administrative district (Gabi Rasu), Afar Zone (Fig. 1). The surveyed area (geographic reference: 9.407° N, 40.057° E) includes the watershed vicinity of the Kesem and Kebena Rivers (tributaries of the Awash River) where Plio-Pleistocene outcrops flank the Awash floodplain parallel to the river and west of the Dofan Volcano. The Fentale Vlcano lies SSW of the Kesem-Kebena-Dulecha area, immediately south of where the Main Ethiopian Rift opens into a floodplain, and offset drainages north of the Dulecha River delimit the area on the north. The Kesem-Kebena-Dulecha area was unknown paleoanthropologically prior to the PIE’s fieldwork, which designated localities with KK (Kesem Kebena) and a unique integer for the locality. The PIE named localities from KK 1 to KK 7, ranging in age from Pliocene (KK 1 and KK 2) through later Pleistocene. Localities are identified by the white, numbered circles on Fig. 1. We continue to follow the nomenclature established by the PIE for consistency’s sake. The most significant discovery of the PIE was the Acheulean lithic and faunal assemblages at the KK 6 locality (Table 1). The PIE took several geological samples, and those from the KK 6 area date to c. 1.0 million years ago (Ma), nearly identical in age to the Harreya Pumice Unit of the Daka Member of the Bouri Formation (Gilbert & Asfaw, 2008).