Kintampo Complex

[4] Watson (2005) states:[1] Based on excavation and archaeological data from the Sahara, Sahel and southern West Africa, this article proposes a migration model as explanation for the distinctive discontinuity signalled by the appearance of the Kintampo Tradition between 3,600 bp-3,200 bp and the origin of food production in the forest/forested zone, similar to the event envisaged by DAVIES (1966, 1980).

Distinctions between the pottery of the Kintampo and indigenous Punpun foragers are a critical element of this argument, as fundamental stylistic and, especially, technological differences observed correspond to social and/or ethnic boundaries documented in ethnoarchaeological studies.

The Punpun and Kintampo Traditions were two distinct socio-economic groups whose co-occupation of central Ghana signals the meeting of two different' worlds', represented by the 'Saharan derived' agro-pastoralists from the Sahel, who brought with them the values/technologies associated with food production (e.g. social differentiation), which eventually dominated a landscape that had been previously occupied solely by 'southern' hunter-gatherers.

Pearl millet cultivation spread quickly throughout the Niger River Basin, from the Tilemsi Valley in Mali to northern Burkina Faso (Tin-Akof, Oursi West) and to the rainforest of Ghana [4.

[1] The people of Kintampo lived in open-air villages composed of rectangular structures made from wattle and daub construction techniques.

Some houses used mud and clay, and many were found to have been supported by wooden poles and some had stone foundations made of granite and laterite.

The stone core was placed on a hard level surface such as a large rock, log, or trunk, then struck from above, forcing flakes to separate from the material from underneath.

At the sites of Boyase hill and Ntersero, clay figurines of animals like dogs, lizards and cows were found, though it is not well understood what their meaning might be.

[11] The Kintampo site is most often studied by archaeologists who are interested in seeing how people made the change between foraging and horticulture and agriculture as a way of producing food.

Other wild animals such as monitor lizards, snails, guineafowl, vervet monkey, baboon, turtles and tortoises royal and duiker antelopes, giant pouched and cane rats were hunted as game.

[13] Nearly all of the archaeological sites that have been detected or excavated in this region are found near the modern day city or town of Nkoranza and Techiman.

[3] The rockshelters of Kintampo appear to be abandoned by the second century BCE, and then in the early first millennium CE, iron metallurgy became the dominant technology of the region.

The Bono enslaved their enemies and prisoners of war from the north and to the Coast, and made a profit by selling them in the transatlantic slave trade.

Kintampo sites within West Africa
West African sites with archaeobotanical remains from third to first millennium cal bc. The arrows indicate directions of pearl millet diffusion into sub-Saharan West Africa , including 4. Kintampo B-Sites and 14. Bosumpra Cave .
An example of a microlith projectile point, a very small stone tool. The shape of this one is similar to the ones that have been discovered at Kintampo sites.
"Stone rasp " and pottery fragments of the Kintampo culture
The cowpea, also known as the black-eyed pea.
Pearl millet, the most common variety of millet.
The fruit of the African oil palm
A panel of wattle being created. This ancient construction material is made by weaving straw or reeds into a rigid sheet( the wattle). The next step is to cover the sheet in daub, a compound that was typically made from clays and animal dung to fortify the wattle. The result is a sturdy structure that very much resembles a wall. The peoples of Kintampo used this as their primary construction technique.