Kariandusi is one of the first discovered Lower Paleolithic sites in East Africa. There is enough geological evidence to that at times in the past; large lakes, sometimes reaching levels hundreds of meters higher than the Present Lake Nakuru and Elementaita have occupied the basin.
Kariandusi is possibly the first Acheulian site to have been found in Situ in East Africa. Leakey a reknown paleontologist believed that the site was a factory site of the Acheulian period. He did this conclusion after numerous collections of specimens that lay in the Kariandusi riverbed.
The site which is Acheulian is known to have a time range of about 0.7 to about 1.0 million year. This was given after potassium-Argon dating. It thus falls in the lower Pleistocene age.
The site was found in 1928. It consists of a living site of hand-axe man. A rise in the Lake level drove the men of that period from their lake-side home and buried all the tools and weapons which they left behind in their hurried withdrawal. The Acheulian stage of the great hand-axe culture to which this site belongs is found over a very widespread area from England, France, and Southwest Europe generally to Cape Town.
The site was presented to the Trustees of the Royal National parks of Kenya by Lady Eleanor Cole.
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Kariandusi lies on the eastern side of the Rift Valley, about 120-km north north west of Nairobi; and about 2 km to the East Side of Lake Elementaita. It is situated at 0°, 28s, and 36° 17E. The site rests on the Nakuru-Elementaita basin which occupies the width of the Rift valley, flanked by Menengai crater on the north and the volcanic pile of Mount Eburru, on the south. |
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