Man hunted with spears half a million years ago

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Man began hunting with stone-tipped spears half a million years ago, some 200,000 years earlier than previously thought, according to a new study. Scientists have discovered our ancestors began hunting with stone-tipped spears 500,000 years ago – with the help of a special crossbow and a dead springbok. Up until recently, it was thought attaching a stone tip to a spear – known as “hafting” – started about 300,000 years ago. However, by comparing the wear visible on 500,000-year-old stone points found in South Africa with modern experimental points fired by a specially calibrated crossbow at a springbok carcass, scientists proved they had been used as spear tips for hunting. Leader author Jayne Wilkins, a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto in Canada, said the research suggested stone-tipped spears could have been in use before the divergence of early humans and Neanderthals. She said: “This changes the way we think about early human adaptations and capacities before the origin of our own species. “Although both Neanderthals and humans used stone-tipped spears, this is the first evidence that the technology originated prior to or near the divergence of these two species.” Attaching stone points to spears was an important advance in hunting weaponry for early humans. Hafted tools require more effort and planning to manufacture, but a sharp stone point on the end of a spear can increase its killing power. Hafted spear tips are common in Stone Age archaeological sites after 300,000 years ago. The new study – which examined 500,00-year-old stone points from the South African archaeological site of Kathu Pan 1- shows that they were also used in the early Middle Pleistocene, a period associated with Homo heidelbergensis, the last common ancestor of Neandertals, and modern humans. Ms Wilkins and colleagues from Arizona State University and the University of Cape Town, compared the ancient stone points to experimental points which they hafted to wooden dowels using Acacia resin and sinew before thrusting them into a springbok with a mounted crossbow. The method has been used effectively to study weaponry from more recent contexts in the Middle East and southern Africa. The stone points exhibit certain types of breaks that occur more commonly when they are used to tip spears compared to other uses. “The archaeological points have damage that is very similar to replica spear points used in our spearing experiment,” said Ms Wilkins.
“This type of damage is not easily created through other processes.” “It now looks like some of the traits that we associate with modern humans and our nearest relatives can be traced further back in our lineage.” The findings were published in the journal Science.