{"id":345926,"date":"2025-12-15T21:35:47","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T21:35:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/aerospace\/could-these-400000-year-old-rock-fragments-be-the-oldest-known-evidence-of-human-fire-making\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T21:35:47","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T21:35:47","slug":"could-these-400000-year-old-rock-fragments-be-the-oldest-known-evidence-of-human-fire-making","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=345926","title":{"rendered":"Could These 400,000-Year-Old Rock Fragments Be the Oldest Known Evidence of Human Fire-Making?"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Evidence from a site in southeast England suggests early humans were purposefully and repeatedly igniting blazes roughly 350,000 years earlier than previously thought<\/h2>\n
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Sarah Kuta<\/a><\/p>\n

– Daily Correspondent<\/span><\/p>\n

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An artist’s interpretation of an early human ancestor striking flint on a piece of iron pyrite.
\n Craig Williams, The Trustees of the British Museum<\/span>
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Archaeologists were digging at a site in England when they stumbled upon some reddish-colored sediment, several flint handaxes and a few rock fragments. To the casual observer, that may not sound like much\u2014but to the researchers, the discoveries were utterly thrilling.<\/p>\n

Together, the finds may provide the oldest-known evidence of deliberate fire-making anywhere in the world, scientists report in a paper published this month in the journal\u00a0Nature<\/em><\/a>. They suspect Neanderthals were intentionally igniting blazes here roughly 400,000 years ago, which pushes back the hominin fire-making timeline by 350,000 years.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, personally, it\u2019s the most exciting discovery of my 40-year career,\u201d says study co-author\u00a0Nick Ashton<\/a>, an archaeologist at the British Museum, to\u00a0NPR<\/a>\u2019s Nathan Rott.<\/p>\n

The objects were found at an archaeological site called East Farm Barnham, located in an abandoned clay pit in southeast England. The site was initially discovered more than a century ago, and the latest round of excavations has been underway since 2013.<\/p>\n

Based on their discoveries so far, researchers think the site may have been a seasonal hunter-gatherer camp, possibly used by an early human ancestor called Homo heidelbergensis<\/em> around 400,000 years ago, per\u00a0National Geographic<\/em><\/a>\u2019s Tom Metcalfe. Evidence from other nearby sites suggests Neanderthals were also living in the region around the same time.<\/p>\n

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The discoveries come from a 400,000-year-old site in southeast England.<\/p>\n

Jordan Mansfield, Pathways to Ancient Britain Project<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now, archaeologists think that Neanderthals\u2014or, maybe, H. heidelbergensis<\/em>\u2014were setting fires at the site. The rock fragments they found were made of iron pyrite, a mineral that produces sparks when struck with flint. The reddish sediment they found got its unique color from being heated, while the flint handaxes showed signs of cracking and shattering from being exposed to high temperatures.<\/p>\n

Iron pyrite, which is the mineral form of iron disulfide, does form naturally in the ground. However, researchers found no evidence of natural pyrite accumulations in the immediate vicinity\u2014the nearest known source is roughly 40 miles away, per the\u00a0New York Times<\/em><\/a>\u2019 Carl Zimmer\u2014which suggests someone brought the fragments to the site.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know of any other uses for pyrite other than to make sparks with flint to start fires,\u201d\u00a0Dennis Sandgathe<\/a>, an archaeologist at Simon Fraser University in Canada who wasn\u2019t involved with the research, tells NPR. \u201cAnd of all the dozens and dozens of sites across Eurasia and into Africa that we\u2019ve excavated that have fire residues in them, nobody\u2019s discovered a piece of pyrite before.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Archaeologists suspect iron pyrite found at the site was intentionally transported there.<\/p>\n

Jordan Mansfield, Pathways to Ancient Britain Project<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Testing revealed the reddish sediment had been heated repeatedly. Researchers also found traces of chemicals that usually result from burning wood.<\/p>\n

Taken together, the findings suggest early human ancestors were purposefully lighting fires here, not simply harnessing and maintaining flames from naturally occurring fires, which hominins had likely already been doing for\u00a0hundreds of thousands of years<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Quick fact: Evidence of early fire-making<\/h4>\n

Previously, the oldest evidence of deliberate fire-making was found at a 50,000-year-old Neanderthal site in France.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cTo me, the modern-day equivalent would be if the police found a burned-out car in a remote bit of woodland with an empty petrol can, and they drew the conclusion one was related to the other,\u201d Ashton tells\u00a0Scientific American<\/em><\/a>\u2019s Meghan Bartels.<\/p>\n

Researchers have not yet discovered any fire-lighting tools at the site, such as stones with evidence of friction from interacting with the iron pyrite, which would help \u201cunequivocally\u201d prove their theory, writes\u00a0S\u00e9gol\u00e8ne Vandevelde<\/a>, an archaeologist at the University of Quebec who was not involved with the research, in an accompanying Nature\u00a0<\/em>commentary<\/a>. Still, even without this evidence, they have \u201csuccessfully built a convincing case,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n

However, some outside researchers are taking a more skeptical view. \u201cThe authors did an excellent job with their analysis of the Barnham data, but they seem to be stretching the evidence,\u201d\u00a0Wil Roebroeks<\/a>, an archaeologist at Leiden University in the Netherlands who was not involved with the research, tells National Geographic<\/em>.<\/p>\n

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The reddish sediment shows signs of being heated repeatedly.<\/p>\n

Jordan Mansfield, Pathways to Ancient Britain Project<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The ability to control naturally occurring fires or make flames on demand was likely a game-changer for early human ancestors. Some researchers think it was instrumental in the development of hominins\u2019 larger brains, since it allowed early humans to cook their food, which made meals easier to chew and digest, per\u00a0NBC News<\/a>\u2019 Evan Bush. Fire may have also contributed to bigger brains by promoting increased socialization, since many individuals likely gathered around a campfire at night.<\/p>\n

Fire likely had other benefits too, according to\u00a0John McNabb<\/a>, an archaeologist at the University of Southampton in England who was not involved with the study.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt can be a tool for defense,\u201d he tells\u00a0CNN<\/a>\u2019s Katie Hunt in an email. \u201cIt can extend the day and make your working time more productive for longer. \u2026 Control fire and you begin to control the world around you.\u201d<\/p>\n

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