Stone Age

13 Stories

Site Highlights Early Humans' Mastery of Wood, Largely Lost

Spear Horizon site shows evidence of splitting, carving wood 300K years ago

(Newser) - The Stone Age, launched roughly 3 million years ago, marks the time when tools first appeared. Early humans used stones for hammering, stones for grinding, and sharp stone flakes as knives and projectile points. But the Stone Age might just as well be called the Wood Age, German archaeologist Thomas...

It Could Be Europe's 'Oldest Man-Made Megastructure'
Beneath the Sea, an Ancient
'Man-Made Megastructure'
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Feb 17, 2024 12:10 PM CST

Beneath the Sea, an Ancient 'Man-Made Megastructure'

Stone Age wall found in sea off Germany thought to have been used to hunt reindeer

(Newser) - More than 10,000 years ago, humans constructed a long, low wall, using rocks weighing a combined 150 tons. Discovered by accident in 2021, the Blinkerwall—submerged 70 feet deep in the Baltic Sea, 6 miles off the coast of Rerik, Germany—is now a candidate for the oldest known...

These Stone Tools Are Smashing Theories on Africa
These Stone Tools
Are Smashing
Theories on Africa
NEW STUDIES
Mar 20, 2018 7:14 PM CDT

These Stone Tools Are Smashing Theories on Africa

At 320K years old, they push back date of Middle Stone Age

(Newser) - For decades, the human story was one told through signs of modernity—art, tools, burials—found only after Homo sapiens left Africa. Recent discoveries pushing back the date of departure are helping to change that narrative, as are three new studies in Science. Together, they describe the earliest stone tools...

Boys Had Good Intentions, Ruin 5K-Year-Old Rock Art

It's 'a national tragedy' in Norway

(Newser) - A 5,000-year-old rock carving of a figure on skis is among the most recognized symbols of Norway. Two kids, however, thought it could use some improving. In what's been described as "a national tragedy," the Norwegian boys are accused of using a sharp tool to retrace...

Ancient Italians Cut Flesh Off the Dead
 Why Ancient People 
 Cut Flesh Off the Dead 
study says
Mar 30, 2015 4:44 PM CDT

Why Ancient People Cut Flesh Off the Dead

Researchers find telling cut marks on prehistoric bones

(Newser) - Farmers living in Italy thousands of years ago had a special relationship with their dead that involved "defleshing" the bones and leaving them in a murky cave, according to a recent study . Researchers gleaned this by looking at bones from 22 Neolithic humans discovered in Scaloria Cave on Italy'...

Wheat Discovery Rewrites Europe's Stone Age History

Ancient Brits apparently weren't as isolated as once believed

(Newser) - Scientists studying a Stone Age site in Britain came across something that by all rights shouldn't have been there: wheat. More specifically, the researchers found the DNA of wheat dating back 8,000 years off the coast of the Isle of Wight, reports Reuters . That's about 2,000...

Under the Baltic Sea, an Incredible Stone Age Find

Thanks to 'gyttja,' even rope has been preserved

(Newser) - Some 52 feet below the surface of the Baltic Sea sits what the media is calling "Sweden's Atlantis"—though that is just a bit of an overstatement. While it's not a lost island, or even a lost village, it's a site that holds "one-of-a-kind"...

'Red Deer Cave People' May Be New Human Species

Stone Age remains found in China puzzle researchers

(Newser) - Bones found in southern China may be evidence of a previously unknown human species, researchers say. The "Red Deer Cave People" survived until some 11,000 years ago, but don't appear to have interbred with neighboring peoples, the BBC reports. Their remains have a puzzling mix of ancient...

Civilization Rose, Thanks to ... Beer?

Stone Age farmers may have liked grains for beer, not food

(Newser) - We may have beer to thank for, well, all of civilization. For years, archaeologists have suspected that when Stone Age people domesticated cereals—which eventually led to farming and settling—they were actually turning the grains into beer more often than food. One researcher tells LiveScience the evidence is getting...

Ape With a Knife Changes Human History

Carved bones found in Africa show Stone Age began a million years earlier

(Newser) - It turns out that human ape Australopithecus afarensis Lucy likely used some kind of stone knife to eat meat 800,000 years earlier than previously thought, which has suddenly cast human history in a new light. The discovery of fossil animal bones showing evidence of being butchered 3.4 million...

Stone Age Humans Found Wisdom in Crowds: Study

(Newser) - The jump in human ingenuity during the Stone Age could have resulted not from a biological change but from closer, more populous communities, NPR reports. “Anything that we teach is going to be susceptible to loss, or to decay,” said the British scientist who cooked up the theory....

Oldest-Known Nuclear Family Unearthed

Murdered Stone Age family found buried in group hug

(Newser) - The oldest nuclear family ever discovered has been found in a group hug in a Stone Age burial site, the Independent reports. Genetic testing revealed that the four skeletons buried in each other's arms at the site in Germany were a father, mother, and their two young sons. All had...

They Weren't Such 'Neanderthals'

Early man brighter than suspected, researchers find

(Newser) - Neanderthals were just as smart as their stone-age rivals, the latest research into the roots of mankind concludes. Scientific teams who learned how to make and use Neanderthal tools found their technology just as efficient as that used by Homo sapiens, reports the Independent. The study runs counter to theories...

13 Stories