Oldest Javelins Predate Modern Humans, Raise Questions on Evolution
Oldest Javelins Predate Modern Humans, Raise Questions on Evolution
By Charles Q. Choi
for National Geographic
Published November 26, 2013
The oldest stone-tipped projectile weapons date to 280,000 years, study says.
The oldest known stone-tipped projectiles have been discovered in Ethiopia. The javelins are roughly 280,000 years old and predate the earliest known fossils of our species, Homo sapiens, by about 80,000 years.
These javelins are some 200,000 years older than previous examples of similar weapons, suggesting that modern humans and their extinct relatives had the know-how to create these sorts of complex thrown projectiles much earlier than often thought.
Scientists investigated stone tools unearthed at the Gademotta Formation on the flanks of an ancient, large collapsed volcanic crater in central Ethiopia's Rift Valley.
"Today, the area represents a ridge overlooking one of the four lakes in the vicinity, Lake Ziway," said researcher Yonatan Sahle, an archaeologist at the University of California, Berkeley. (See "Stone Spear Tips Surprisingly Old—'Like Finding iPods in Ancient Rome.' "
More:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/11/131126-oldest-javelins-stone-weapons-projectiles-human-evolution-science/?rptregcta=reg_free_np&rptregcampaign=20131016_rw_membership_r1p_us_ot_w#close-modal
= new reply since forum marked as read
