Nassarius kraussianus shell beads from Blombos Cave: evidence for symbolic behaviour in the Middle Stone Age.

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Beads for a Plastic Mind: the ‘Blind Man's Stick’ (BMS) Hypothesis and the Active Nature of Material Culture (2008, methodology): “Taphonomic, morphometric and microscopic analysis of MSA, LSA, modern and experimentally modified shells provides evidence of human agency and involvement in the shells’ collection, perforation and use as beads (d’Errico et al. 2005).”
Symbolic use of marine shells and mineral pigments by Iberian Neandertals (2010, background): “I of body decoration—perforated and pigment-stained shells of marine mollusks—are a feature of the Middle Stone Age (MSA) of southern Africa and the Middle Paleolithic (MP) of the Maghreb and Near East (1, 2).”
Coastal South Africa and the Coevolution of the Modern Human Lineage and the Coastal Adaptation (2011, background): “2008), beads (Henshilwood et al. 2004; d’Errico et al. 2005), large quantities of worked and unworked pigments (Watts 1999, 2002), decorated ochre (Henshilwood et al.”
Earliest fire in Africa: towards the convergence of archaeological evidence and the cooking hypothesis (2013, background): “120 ka (d’Errico et al. 2005; Vanhaeren et al. 2006), or in the controlled heating of stone, which has gone back from the Upper Palaeolithic to c.”
The Social Brain and the Shape of the Palaeolithic (2011, background): “Perforated Nassarius shell beads are found in South and North Africa by 80 ka (Bouzouggar et al. 2007; d’Errico et al. 2005; Henshilwood et al. 2004).”