https://www.jpost.com/archaeology/article-902838
Ancient humans precisely navigated northern Israel to find right stones for tools
Basalt held special importance at GBY (Gesher Benot Ya’akov), particularly for producing large cutting tools like handaxes and cleavers
Early hominins living in the ancient Galilee were able to navigate their landscape with remarkable precision to locate specific rock sources for their tools, according to a new study.
Gesher Benot Ya’akov (GBY), one of Israel’s most important prehistoric sites, dates back to about 780,000 years ago. It preserves multiple Acheulian hominin settlements along the shores of paleo-Lake Hula in northern Israel.
Excavations at the site, directed by study co-author Professor Naama Goren-Inbar from the Hebrew University, have previously unearthed stone tools made of flint, limestone, and basalt. Evidence of fire use, plant exploitation, animal processing, and fish consumption has also been discovered at the site.
Basalt seemingly held special importance at GBY, particularly for the production of large cutting tools such as hand axes and cleavers.
Earlier research has shown that making such tools was no simple task: hominins had to select large basalt slabs, work them down into massive cores, strike off large flakes, and then carefully shape those flakes into finished hand axes.
Such a process required planning, technical skill, and detailed knowledge of basalt’s properties.
Where did materials for their tools come from?
The new study set out to determine exactly where that basalt came from.
By comparing the chemical signatures of basalt tools with samples collected from nearby basalt flows, including material pulled from the Eshel Ya’akov borehole (a deep scientific drilling hole), which reaches basalt layers now buried underground, researchers were able to match many artifacts to sources within about a kilometer of the site.
Interestingly, some of the tools were chemically matched to basalt sources that no longer exist on the surface. These sources may have been buried over time or eroded away by millennia of tectonic activity, the study explained.
Different basalt used for different tools
Additionally, the chemical analysis revealed that the tools varied in type.
Some cleavers seem to have been made from basalt sources different from those used to produce most hand axes and giant cores.
According to the study, early hominins deliberately sought out basalt with specific qualities suited to particular tools.
Further, while the giant cores were consistently linked to basalt found close by or now hidden beneath the site, some of the cleavers discovered appear to have been made from basalt that doesn’t match any of the local, sampled sources.
Even more notable, the pattern of selective sourcing appears repeatedly across multiple archaeological layers at GBY, spanning tens of thousands of years, suggesting it wasn’t a one-off choice but a tradition passed down through generations.
Taken together, the findings paint a picture of early hominins as far more than opportunistic scavengers of whatever stone lay around.
Ancient hominins appear to have carried detailed mental maps of their surroundings, understood how the landscape around them was changing, and applied that knowledge purposefully, choosing “the right rock for the right tool at the right time.”
The complete findings were published in the journal Scientific Reports in early June, titled “Geochemical basalt investigation reveals procurement strategy at the Acheulian site of Gesher Benot Ya‘aqov, Dead Sea Transform, Israel.”
The research was led by Dr. Tzahi Golan and Dr. Yoav Ben Dor of the Geological Survey of Israel, together with Prof. Naama Goren-Inbar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who has directed excavations at the site for decades.
https://www.jpost.com/archaeology/article-902838
On a Quest for Million-year-old Culture in Northern Israel
"This is holy ground – the most important [hominin] site in the world."
He immediately qualifies: "Among the most important [hominin] sites in the world."
"I don't care much about human bones – bones get grants, but what can we learn from them? Almost nothing about the hominins' cognitive abilities," Sharon says.
"We can learn so much more from a stone they shaped, how they did it, why they did it, what led them to make it, why they chose that stone. What matters isn't who they were," he continues. "What matters is what the evidence of their activity can tell us about their culture, whoever they were, almost a million years ago."
The evidence of human activity is stone tools, mostly made of local basalt and some of flint of uncertain origin, and marks on animal bones.
And controlled fire. Nira Alperson-Afil and Goren-Inbar, the archaeologists from 30 years ago, and Sharon today argue the scene sports the earliest ever evidence outside Africa for controlled fire, from about 780,000 years ago.
At Gesher Benot Yaakov, the evidence of controlled fire is concentrations of burned flint (over a certain heat, the stone changes color). If the stones had been burned by random brushfire, discolored stones they'd be randomly scattered all over the place. But they're not.
It isn't that the hominins used the same hearth over the 100,000-year sequence under investigation. However, at different points in time over that sequence, they created and maintained hearths at specific spots on the site, Sharon explains. Not necessarily always the same spot over the eons.
"A concentration of burned flint is a fireplace," he sums up.
What about the argument that maybe they "harvested" fire from a wildfire, and maintained it? You can't keep a brushfire running for 50,000 years, he answers. "The fact that you find fire in these places means they controlled fire – they knew how to start, keep it, use it. This is the earliest evidence outside Africa."
In Africa the earliest claimed evidence for controlled fire is a million years ago at Wonderwerk Cave in today's South Africa; some argue the case of another Israeli cave which may have evidence of fire even earlier, also possibly a million years.
They also ate vegetable matter, and the preservation is so extraordinary that we may have a clue what it was. For example, we know figs and plums existed there while carobs didn't. There were also a lot of nuts, which the hominins would have eaten with the help of nutcrackers the archaeologists have identified at the site.
What is a million-year-old nutcracker? Basically, anvils. Stones with concavities: place the nut in the pit, bash it with another stone and you have a cracked nut. Monkeys use nutting stones, Sharon says; no reason to think the hominins couldn't.
"We are going back to the most important site on Earth to open up a large area, to use new technology, to try to answer the many questions that arose from the amazing excavations," he says, summing up their new quest in what had once been paradise.
https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/2024-09-30/ty-article-magazine/on-a-quest-for-million-year-old-culture-in-northern-israel/00000192-4241-d07b-aff3-57e731d60000
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