Ancient humans made tools from animal bones 1.5 million years ago
WASHINGTON — Early humans were regularly using animal bones to make cutting tools 1.5 million years ago.
WASHINGTON — Early humans were regularly using animal bones to make cutting tools 1.5 million years ago.
A newly discovered cache of 27 carved and sharpened bones from elephants and hippos found in Tanzania’s Olduvai Gorge site pushes back the date for ancient bone tool use by around 1 million years. Researchers know that early people made simple tools from stones as early as 3.3 million years ago.
The new discovery, published Wednesday in Nature, reveals that ancient humans “had rather more complex tool kits than previously we thought,” incorporating a variety of materials, said William Harcourt-Smith, a paleoanthropologist at the American Museum of Natural History, who was not involved in the research.
The well-preserved bone tools, measuring up to around 16 inches (40 centimeters), were likely made by breaking off the thick ends of leg bones and using a stone to knock off flakes from the remaining bone shaft. This technique was used to create one sharpened edge and one pointed tip, said study co-author Ignacio de la Torre, a researcher at the Spanish National Research Council.
The bone tools were “probably used as a hand axe” — a handheld blade that’s not mounted on a stick — for butchering dead animals, he said.
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