Results of Preparatory Surveys on the Tagant Escarpment, Mauritania

Abstract This article reports on a short survey carried out on the Tagant escarpment in southeastern Mauritania. This area has a great number of stone-built settlement and funerary sites and an unknown number of sites without stone architecture. The sites show continuity with the well-known neighbouring Tichitt complex of the Ceramic Late Stone Age. However, the Tagant escarpment has so far only been subject to one programme of fieldwork in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Recently, remote sensing work has been carried out there, but many important questions remain unanswered. This article presents the archaeological remains of two areas on the escarpment, laying the groundwork for future field research in this part of Mauritania.