DR Congo - Depression of the Upemba

This vast depression has delivered the largest cemeteries known south of the Sahara. More than 40 archaeological sites have been listed, but only six of them have been partially excavated so far. Their study makes it possible to trace the complete sequence of the occupation of the region over more than two millennia and thus to reconstruct the history of a major ethnic group of Central Africa: the Luba. The chronology based on more than 55 radiocarbon and thermoluminescence dates is thus established in the northern half of the depression: - Age of the recent stone 2.340 ~ 145 bp - Kamibambian 7th century AD - Ancient Kisalan 8th - 10th centuries - Classical Kisalian 10th - 12th centuries - Kabambian A 13th - 15th centuries - Kabambian B 16th - 17th centuries - Luba recent 18th - 20th centuries. Katotian flowers south of the depression during Kisalian.