Discovery in Tanzania Pushes Back Early Human Bone Tool Use to 1.5 Million Years Ago

When humans started using tools: the theories and the evidence

For a long time, tool technology was seen as a uniquely human trait, associated with the genus ‘Homo’. Now we know tools go much further back in history.

Study dates ancient human bone tools

WASHINGTON — Early humans regularly used animal bones to make cutting tools 1.5 million years ago.

Study dates ancient human bone tools to 1.5M years ago

WASHINGTON — Early humans regularly used animal bones to make cutting tools 1.5 million years ago.

Finds on the Kalambo River, which forms a border between Zambia and Tanzania, prove that already ancestors of our species humans (Homo sapiens) could work on wood and use it for constructions. Traces of pre-humans exist not only in Africa, but also in Europe. The history of humans and human-likes who use tools to produce objects is millions of years old. In 2023, researchers published in the journal Nature a find that they made on the Kalambo Ri…

New research reveals ancient humans used animal bone tools much earlier than thought

The handcrafted tools found in Tanzania were made 1.5 million years ago and were fashioned primarily from the bones of elephants and hippopotamuses.

Early humans made tools from bones 1 million years sooner than scientists thought : Short Wave

Archeologists know early humans used stone to make tools long before the time of Homo sapiens. But a new discovery out this week in Nature suggests early humans in eastern Africa were also using animal bones – one million years earlier than researchers previously thought. The finding suggests that these early humans were intentionally shaping animal materials – like elephant and hippopotamus bones – to make tools and that it could indicate advan…