Our prehistoric human ancestors relied on deliberately modified and sharpened stone tools as early as 3.3 million years ago.

Nyayanga site being excavated in July 2016. Credit: J.S. Oliver, Homa Peninsula Paleoanthropology Project “The assumption among researchers has long been that only the genus Homo, to which humans ...

Nearly 3 million years ago, hominids employed stone tool kits to butcher hippos and pound plants along what’s now the shores of Kenya’s Lake Victoria, researchers say. Evidence of those food ...

Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. An international team of archaeologists recently uncovered some of ...

A fossil hippo skeleton and associated Oldowan artifacts were exposed at the Nyayanga site. T.W. Plummer, Homa Peninsula Paleoanthropological Project The dead hippo represented a stroke of luck to our ...

Macaques use stones as hammers to smash open food items like shellfish and nuts. (Lydia V. Luncz) When monkeys in Thailand use stones as hammers and anvils to help them crack open nuts, they often ...

Have you ever found yourself in a museum's gallery of human origins, staring at a glass case full of rocks labeled "stone tools," muttering under your breath, "How do they know it's not just any old ...

A 1.45-million-year-old hominid leg fossil sports previously unrecognized evidence of our ancient evolutionary relatives butchering and possibly eating one another, a new study claims. An ancient ...

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Along the shores of Africa's Lake Victoria in Kenya roughly 2.9 million years ago, early human ancestors used some of the oldest stone tools ever found to butcher hippos and pound plant material, ...

When monkeys in Thailand use stones as hammers and anvils to help them crack open nuts, they often accidentally create sharp flakes of rock that look like the stone cutting tools made by early humans.