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Previous archaeological and palaeoenvironmental work relating to the late Quaternary of the Lesotho highlands, southern AFrica, is reviewed. Emphasis is placed upon the region's importance for the investigation of late Pleistocene hunter-gatherer settlement-subsistence systems and of the transition from Middle (MSA) to Later Stone Age (LSA) technologies. The paper then reports on the re-excavation of Sehonghong rock-shelter in 1992 and provides an improved radiocarbon chronology for the site and initial results of the analysis of the late Pleistocene and Holocene assemblages recovered. Of particular importance is the identification of assemblages transitional between MSA and LSA stoneworking techniques, but a re-assessment of the existing industrial subdivisions of the Later Stone Age of southern Africa may also be supported by the Sehonghong sequence. The palaeoenvironmental potential of the extensive faunal and botanical assemblages recovered is stressed, especially given the limited extent of previous palaeoenvironmental work in Lesotho. The importance of the Lesotho highlands for investigating differences in site use and subsistence strategies through the late Pleistocene and the Holocene is emphasized, within an overall aim of testing previously proposed models of resource exploitation under glacial and interglacial conditions.