Evidence for the earliest structural use of wood at least 476,000 years ago.

ABSTRACT: Wood artefacts rarely survive from the Early Stone Age since they require exceptional conditions for preservation; consequently, we have limited information about when and how hominins used this basic raw material¹. We report here on the earliest evidence for structural use of wood in the archaeological record. Waterlogged deposits at the archaeological site of Kalambo Falls, Zambia, dated by luminescence to at least 476 ± 23 kyr ago (ka), preserved two interlocking logs joined transversely by an intentionally cut notch. This construction has no known parallels in the African or Eurasian Palaeolithic. The earliest known wood artefact is a fragment of polished plank from the Acheulean site of Gesher Benot Ya'aqov, Israel, more than 780 ka (refs. ^2,3). Wooden tools for

SUBMITTER: Barham L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10550827 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature