Newswise — The researchers: "Our findings indicate that early humans were highly capable: they planned and implemented complex strategies and passed on essential information from one generation to the next."
A new study by researchers from Tel Aviv University and Tel-Hai College has solved an old mystery. They wanted to know where early humans in the Hula Valley found the special rock (flint) to make their ancient tools called handaxes. To figure this out, they used advanced methods of chemical analysis and AI to study the handaxes found at two prehistoric sites in the Hula Valley: Ma'ayan Barukh and Gesher Benot Ya'aqov.
The researchers found out that the raw material used to make the handaxes came from a place called the Dishon Plateau, which is about 20 kilometers away to the west and much higher above the Hula Valley. This means that early humans traveled quite a distance and went up a steep area to get the high-quality flint they needed.
From these findings, the researchers concluded that these early humans were very clever and capable. They knew their surroundings well, understood where to find the best resources, and were willing to go on long journeys to get the materials they needed. They were also good at passing this knowledge to future generations.
Dr. Meir Finkel from Tel Aviv University and Prof. Gonen Sharon from Tel-Hai College led the study. They worked together with Prof. Erez Ben-Yosef from Tel Aviv University, Dr. Oded Bar, and Dr. Yoav Ben Dor from the Geological Survey of Israel, as well as Ofir Tirosh from the Hebrew University. The findings of their research were published in a scientific journal called Geoarchaeology.
Dr. Finkel explains that the Hula Valley has lots of ancient sites, with the oldest ones going back 750,000 years. Early humans lived there because it had plenty of water, plants, and animals, making it a good place to live. These early people used flint stones to make handaxes, which were like versatile tools for many tasks such as cutting meat, digging for water, and getting roots. Handaxes were used by humans all over the Old World, in places like Africa, Asia, and Europe, for a very long time - about 1.5 million years.
In their recent study, the researchers wanted to find out where the raw material came from to make thousands of handaxes found at two prehistoric sites in the Hula Valley: Gesher Benot Ya'aqov (dated to 750,000 years ago) and Ma'ayan Barukh (dated to 500,000 years ago), both belonging to the Acheulian culture.
Prof. Sharon explained that they discovered around 3,500 handaxes scattered on the ground at Ma'ayan Barukh and even more at Gesher Benot Ya'aqov. Each handaxe was about 10cm long and weighed about 200g. To make one handaxe, they needed at least 1kg of raw material. So, to create all the 3,500 handaxes at Ma'ayan Barukh, they would have needed 3.5 tons of flint!
The big question was where they found such a huge amount of flint. Previous researchers tried to answer this question, but this study was the first to use advanced technologies of the 21st century like chemical analysis and a special AI algorithm made specifically for this purpose.
The researchers collected 20 handaxes, 10 from Gesher Benot Ya'aqov and 10 from Ma'ayan Barukh. They turned these handaxes into powder and dissolved the powder in acid in a controlled and clean laboratory. Using a highly advanced device called an ICP-MS (inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer), they measured the concentration of around 40 different chemical elements in each sample. The ICP-MS is a cutting-edge tool that can precisely measure the amount of various elements, even at an incredibly high resolution of one particle per billion.
The researchers wanted to find out where the flint used by the prehistoric people in the Hula Valley came from. To do this, they conducted a careful field survey in various areas like the Safed Mountains, Ramim Ridge, Golan Heights, and Dishon Plateau. They also collected cobbles from streams that flowed into the Hula Valley, such as the Jordan, Ayun, Dishon, Rosh Pina, and Mahanayeem.
To support their field survey, they thoroughly reviewed existing literature, led by Dr. Bar from the Geological Survey of Israel. After gathering flint samples from all the possible sources they found, they used ICP-MS technology to analyze them. This allowed them to compare the chemical composition of the flint with the handaxes. To make this comparison, they used a new computational approach specially developed by Dr. Ben Dor from the Geological Survey of Israel.
According to Dr. Ben Dor, the process of collecting and preparing samples for chemical analysis generated a vast amount of data for each sample. To effectively compare the data from the archaeological artifacts with the data from the flint sources, they created a special algorithm. This algorithm involved various computational steps and machine learning models. Through this approach, they successfully classified the archaeological artifacts based on the information obtained from the geological samples database.
Dr. Finkel found that all 20 archaeological artifacts were made from flint that came from one specific place called the Dishon Plateau. This flint is from a very long time ago, dating back to the Eocene geological epoch. The Dishon Plateau is about 20km west of the Gesher Benot Ya'aqov and Ma'ayan Barukh sites. At the Dishon Plateau, they also discovered evidence of an ancient flint extraction and reduction complex. This means that the place was used as a source of flint for hundreds of thousands of years in the past. Moreover, Dr. Finkel showed that the cobbles from the streams flowing into the Hula Valley were too small to be used as raw material for making handaxes. So, it's clear that those cobbles couldn't have been used to create the artifacts they found.
Prof. Ben-Yosef's research shows that ancient humans who lived in the Hula Valley a very long time ago, probably a species called homo erectus, were very smart and social. They knew how to make special tools called handaxes, which were crucial for their survival. To find the right materials for these tools, they would plan and walk long distances, sometimes up steep hills, covering about 20km. They also passed this knowledge from one generation to the next for many thousands of years. These discoveries suggest that these early humans were much more advanced and capable than what scientists previously thought about prehistoric people from that time.
RSS