An earlier origin for the Acheulian

Christopher J. Lepre (), Hélène Roche, Dennis V. Kent, Sonia Harmand, Rhonda L. Quinn, Jean-Philippe Brugal, Pierre-Jean Texier, Arnaud Lenoble and Craig S. Feibel
Additional contact information
Christopher J. Lepre: Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory
Hélène Roche: UMR CNRS 7055, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre
Dennis V. Kent: Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory
Sonia Harmand: UMR CNRS 7055, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre
Rhonda L. Quinn: Rutgers University
Jean-Philippe Brugal: UMR CNRS 6636, Maison Méditerranéenne des Sciences de l’Homme, BP 647-F-13094
Pierre-Jean Texier: UMR CNRS 5199-PACEA, Université de Bordeaux1
Arnaud Lenoble: UMR CNRS 5199-PACEA, Université de Bordeaux1
Craig S. Feibel: Rutgers University

Nature, 2011, vol. 477, issue 7362, 82-85

Abstract: The oldest Acheulian tools The earliest known stone tools are simple flakes chipped roughly from a core, called the Oldowan tradition. The more advanced Acheulian culture followed, characterized by leaf-shaped bifaces or 'hand axes'. The Acheulian is thought of as the signature technology of Homo erectus. The timing of the emergence of the Acheulian remains unclear because well-dated sites older than 1.4 million years are scarce. A new stratigraphic study at the Kokiselei archaeological site in West Turkana in Kenya, where both Oldowan and Acheulian tools are found, has yielded the world's oldest Acheulian stone tools, dating to 1.76 million years old — 350,000 years older than the previous earliest-known record of Acheulian artefacts. As the first records of hominins outside Africa include either no tools or only Oldowan-type tools, the research also suggests that the first Eurasian hominins to have left Africa might not have taken Acheulian culture with them.

Date: 2011
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DOI: 10.1038/nature10372

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