Stone tipped spears predate humans by 85,000

[taniwha]

I came across this web surfing ...

http://archive.archa...efs/spears.html

Hi Lightly

can you link us photo samples/evidence to examine, cheers.

[Harte]

I came across this web surfing ...

http://archive.archa...efs/spears.html

World's Oldest Spears Volume 50 Number 3, May/June 1997 by Arlette P. Kouwenhoven

Radiocarbon dating has confirmed that three wooden spears found in a coal mine in Schöningen, near Hannover, Germany, are the oldest complete hunting weapons ever found. Some 380,000 to 400,000 years old, the six- to 7.5-foot javelins were found in soil whose acids had been neutralized by a high concentration of chalk near the coal pit. They suggest that early man was able to hunt, and was not just a scavenger. The development of such weapons may have been crucial to the settling of Stone Age northern Europe, whose cold climate and short daylight hours limited hunting.

**more in link ^

https://asunews.asu....115_stonespears

A collaborative study involving researchers at Arizona State University, the University of Toronto, and the University of Cape Town found that human ancestors were making stone-tipped weapons 500,000 years ago at the South African archaeological site of Kathu Pan 1 – 200,000 years earlier than previously thought. This study, “Evidence for Early Hafted Hunting Technology,” is published in the Nov. 16 issue of the journal Science.

Hafted spear tips are common in Stone Age archaeological sites after 300,000 years ago. This study shows that hafted spear tips were also used in the early Middle Pleistocene, a period associated with Homo heidelbergensis, the last common ancestor of Neandertals and modern humans.

“Rather than being invented twice, or by one group learning from the other, stone-tipped spear technology was in place much earlier,” said Schoville. "Although both Neandertals and humans used stone-tipped spears, this is the first evidence that this technology originated prior to or near the divergence of these two species."

From this link:

In 2010, a team directed by coauthor Michael Chazan from the University of Toronto reported that the point-bearing deposits at KP1 dated to around 500,000 years ago using optically stimulated luminescence and U-series/electron spin resonance methods. The dating analyses were carried out by Naomi Porat, Geological Survey of Israel, and Rainer Grün, Australian National University.

You can't date anything that old with radiocarbon dating.

Archaeology mag is usually better than this. Maybe I should apply for a job with them proofreading the airheads' articles they publish.

Harte

[Mentalcase]

Boy if I just went off of the title.. lol

[lightly]

From this link:

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You can't date anything that old with radiocarbon dating.

Archaeology mag is usually better than this. Maybe I should apply for a job with them proofreading the airheads' articles they publish.

Harte

Thanks Harte. I actually wondered how valid the info was .. and even posted that someone (like you or Swede or Cormac or q) would be along directly ..if it was questionable.. then deleted it thinking that a publication coming from the Archaeological Institute of America might be a safe bet.

I remember now, radiocarbon dating is only accurate to about 50k ?

Fortunately, posting something incorrect or asking extra stupid questions often has beneficial results in here .. hehe.

Edited November 17, 2013 by lightly

[lightly]

Hi Lightly

can you link us photo samples/evidence to examine, cheers.

I can try, Cheers.

http://irisharchaeology.ie/2012/10/the-worlds-oldest-spears-the-schoningen-javelins/

https://reinep.wordpress.com/2010/04/07/400000-year-old-spears-found-in-an-german-coal-mine/

[Frank Merton]

Thanks Harte. I actually wondered how valid the info was .. and even posted that someone (like you or Swede or Cormac or q) would be along directly ..if it was questionable.. then deleted it thinking that a publication coming from the Archaeological Institute of America might be a safe bet.

I remember now, radiocarbon dating is only accurate to about 50k ?

Fortunately, posting something incorrect or asking extra stupid questions often has beneficial results in here .. hehe.

I think that is about right. The amount of radioactive carbon steadily decreases and about that point becomes too little to measure accurately enough. Paleontologists however over the years have found a whole repertoire of dating methods for much older materials, usually based on radioactive decay of other elements.

[Frank Merton]

It enters my head that if pre-humans had spears with points attached, then they also had string or twine or something like that too -- perhaps a more important thing than the actual spears in the end.

[Piney]

It enters my head that if pre-humans had spears with points attached, then they also had string or twine or something like that too -- perhaps a more important thing than the actual spears in the end.

Not necessarily in the case of hafting a point. The Archaic Piedmont/Piney Island points found in the Eastern U.S. were attached using bone sockets and pitch.