Ostrich eggshell beads reveal 50k-year-old social network across Africa

By comparing OES bead characteristics, such as total diameter, aperture diameter and shell thickness, Miller and Wang found that between 50,000 and 33,000 years ago, people in eastern and southern Africa were using nearly identical OES beads. The finding suggests a long-distance social network spanning more than 3,000 km once connected people in the two regions.

"Social network", "population connectivity", and similar terms seem to be chosen to paint a very modern picture of one of the oldest trade-networks yet discovered. Such language suggests that people across Africa were in regular communication with each other through this network, much like people across the internet today. The truth is that there was probably zero social "connectivity" between people in this network beyond with their immediate neighbours, and it was almost certainly more about trade than socialization even then.

Trade networks occur wherever humans go. People have too much of the local stuff and not enough of the exotic stuff, so they trade one for the other with their neighbors. Trade networks rise, ramify, change, and occasionally break down. Pre-contact North America had trade networks that spanned the continent, but it's likely that people at the far end of the network from any particular trade-good had no idea where it really came from. Such networks do not require continent roaming traders to operate. It was likely patently unsafe for anyone to travel too far from their home territory and totally unnecessary for continent spanning trade networks to operate. All it took was neighbours trading with neighbours who then trade with their neighbours, and so on.

In particular, OES beads were likely to penetrate further into trade networks than most other commodities. Portable, valuable and not likely to break from wear and tear, they could have criss-crossed Africa several times over before winding up in a midden heap or burial. They were a bit like coins in this respect. During classical times, Roman coins penetrated far into areas where nobody had even heard of the Romans.