Human culture is both cumulative and dynamic. Hunter-gatherers
are
typically nomadic because their mode of exploitation of their
environment is extensive rather than intensive. Nomads travel light: if
they acquire a new artifact, they discard an old one. At the same time,
having a restricted range of cultural achievements greatly reduces the
chances of one thing leading to another. Some lucky hunter-gatherer
populations have inhabited niches so rich that they have been able to
dispense with nomadism. One example is the European reindeer hunters of
the Magdalenian culture in the last millennia of the Upper
Palaeolithic. Indeed, the last stages of pre-Neolithic culture in some
regions seem to be appreciably richer than what went before them. This
has led archaeologists to place them in an intermediate category
described as 'Mesolithic'.
