Standardized production of bone tools by our ancestors pushed back 1 million years
Twenty-seven standardized bone tools dating back more than 1.5 million years were recently discovered in the Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania by a team of scientists from the CNRS and l'Universit茅 de Bordeaux, in collaboration with international and Tanzanian researchers.
The study was in the journal Nature.
This discovery challenges our understanding of early hominin technological evolution, as the oldest previously known standardized bone tools date back approximately 500,000 years.
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Bone tools found in Olduvai, photographed in the Pleistocene Archaeology Lab of CSIC. Credit: CSIC -
Bone tools found in Olduvai, photographed in the Pleistocene Archaeology Lab of CSIC. Credit: CSIC
During these excavations, the researchers identified tools shaped on-site from hippopotamus bones within the same geological layer. More surprisingly, they also found elephant bones that had been transported to the site as either tools or raw materials for tool-making.
This behavior suggests an early ability for planning and the transmission of know-how among these ancient populations.
These results were obtained via an approach combining archaeological excavations and experimental archaeology.
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Bone tools found in Olduvai, photographed in the Pleistocene Archaeology Lab of CSIC. Credit: CSIC -
Bone tools found in Olduvai, photographed in the Pleistocene Archaeology Lab of CSIC. Credit: CSIC
More information: Esther Garc铆a Pastor, Systematic bone tool production at 1.5 million years ago, Nature (2025). .
Journal information: Nature
Provided by CNRS
