Research that could set humanity back 20,000 years!

[3113]

Human behaviour, as we know it, emerged 44,000 years ago - much earlier than previously thought, according to a new study.
An international team of scientists have substantially increased the age at which we can trace the emergence of modern culture, thanks to research into hunter-gatherers in South Africa. A key question in human evolution is when in prehistory human cultures similar to ours emerged. Until now, most archaeologists believed that the oldest traces of the San people - a hunter-gatherer culture in southern Africa - dates back 10,000, or at most 20,000 years.

However evidence discovered by the palaeo-anthropology department at Wits University in South Africa show 'without a doub't that people in an area called Border Cave were using digging sticks weighted with perforated stones around 44,000 years ago.

Cool!

Full article here.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

And they still are. Its Africa.

 

[amicus]

And they still are. Its Africa.

~~~


Damn it all to hell,James, you got a guffaw out of me!!

ami (g00d one)

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

~~~


Damn it all to hell,James, you got a guffaw out of me!!

ami (g00d one)

I suspect the Amish are from Africa.

 

[Thefamiliar]

Cool!

Full article here.

That is cool.

Actually keep watching for more discoveries, it naturally happens that ancient sites are discovered after major natural disasters. Earthquakes and such tend to naturally sift the earth.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[TxRad]

I suspect the Amish are from Africa.

So are you in a round about way but we won't tell anyone.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

That is cool.

Actually keep watching for more discoveries, it naturally happens that ancient sites are discovered after major natural disasters. Earthquakes and such tend to naturally sift the earth.

Thanks for sharing.

Border Cave has been under archaeological excavation for quite a few years now. It was discovered in 1933 and first excavated in 1940. It contains human material dating back over 75,000 years, including anatomically modern human bones from that date.

Sites are not generally discovered as a result of natural disasters, though natural processes, such as the shifting of the East African tectonic plate creating the Great Rift Valley, give us good places to look, if you know what you're looking for. Sites are found through intentional searching, based on knowledge of the land, or historic records, or the surface discovery of some artifact, feature, or fossil fragment as well as incidental discovery, often through the excavation associated with construction projects. In many areas, an archaeological survey - a search for sites - must be undertaken before construction can proceed.

Since new sites are being constantly discovered and old ones more extensively researched, we expect Archaeology and Palaeoanthropology to be frequently faced with things that change our understanding of human evolution and history.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

So are you in a round about way but we won't tell anyone.

Least of all the Africans; we wouldn't want to embarass them by letting them know Jimmy is a relative.

 

[Thefamiliar]

Border Cave has been under archaeological excavation for quite a few years now. It was discovered in 1933 and first excavated in 1940. It contains human material dating back over 75,00 years, including anatomically modern human bones from that date.

Sites are not generally discovered as a result of natural disasters, though natural processes, such as the shifting of the East African tectonic plate creating the Great Rift Valley, give us good places to look, if you know what you're looking for. Sites are found through intentional searching, based on knowledge of the land, or historic records, or the surface discovery of some artifact, feature, or fossil fragment as well as incidental discovery, often through the excavation associated with construction projects. In many areas, an archaeological survey - a search for sites - must be undertaken before construction can proceed.

Since new sites are being constantly discovered and old ones more extensively researched, we expect Archaeology and Palaeoanthropology to be frequently faced with things that change our understanding of human evolution and history.

Thank you for the clarification.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Thank you for the clarification.

You're quite welcome, Familiar. I seem to be Lit's resident anthropologist. At least no one else has admitted to it.

Btw, I added a bit of info on Border Cave itself to the post.

 

[Stella_Omega]

So are you in a round about way but we won't tell anyone.

The famous red clay of Georgia is a piece of the African plate, left behind after the big Pan Gaia continent started moving apart.

Not that Jimmy is a Georgia boy, but it's a nice little factlet.

 

[Cruel2BKind]

You're quite welcome, Familiar. I seem to be Lit's resident anthropologist. At least no one else has admitted to it.

Btw, I added a bit of info on Border Cave itself to the post.

It's funny... In my Ancient People's class I saw pics of your avatar, or at least some very similar works of art.

The first lesson that my teacher pounded into our heads was that 'Old' never meant 'primitive'. He hated that word. And he did his best to show us how intelligent people were.

He also yelled at us for calling maize 'corn'.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

So are you in a round about way but we won't tell anyone.

Maybe, maybe not. Just cause youre in Hell dont mean that youre from Hell.

 

[TxRad]

Maybe, maybe not. Just cause youre in Hell dont mean that youre from Hell.

Since all of modern man seems to have come from one place, you are from Africa whether you like it or not.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Since all of modern man seems to have come from one place, you are from Africa whether you like it or not.

Of course I am, I did my genealogy. But here's the deal Mullet Man, my ancestors were pharoahs NOT bush bunnies, Carthaginians NOT spear chuckers. A friend of mine is as black as your heart, her people come from North Africa, too, and she does not care much for efforts to link her to the jungle jivers.

Could be your average African wandered down South, from the North, and atrophied.

 

[rgraham666]

I wonder how long after they used sticks weighted with perforated stones to dig they started using them to bash other people's heads in.

About a week, I figure.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

It's funny... In my Ancient People's class I saw pics of your avatar, or at least some very similar works of art.

The first lesson that my teacher pounded into our heads was that 'Old' never meant 'primitive'. He hated that word. And he did his best to show us how intelligent people were.

He also yelled at us for calling maize 'corn'.

My AV is a piece of Mochica pottery. The Andean people were very fond of erotic ceramics, mostly for fun. The one I have here is a drinking vessel, and I'm sure you can figure out where you drink from. If you're in Boston any time, Harvard's Peabody Museum has the largest collection in North America, but I must warn you: while the exhibit includes a few hundred pieces, only one of those on public display is sexual, and that's a spoon position couple where you can't really see the details. For a public viewing of the erotic pieces, you'll have to head to Peru.

Of course, if you want to prove that "Older" doesn't mean "less intelligent," just take a look at Jimmy Johnson - the dumb walk among us. (Note: we're talking about modern humans' origins over 200,000 years ago, and he responds with some drivel about his relationship to the Egyptian Pharoahs of no more than 5,000 years ago).

And then there's one of my favourite archaeological sites, Terra Amata, in Nice, on the Riviera. Some 380,000 years ago, our nomadic ancestors (we call them at that time "Homo erectus) spent time on the Mediterranean beach. They built huts there, and, since the sand blows over everything each year, we know they returned to the same huts for years in a row (one hut was occupied for twenty years straight). And, from the pollen found in their coprolites, we can also tell that they spent two weeks there every late soring/early summer. Now you try to tell me that people who get to spend two weeks on the Riviera every summer aren't the same as us.

And it is "maize;" "corn" is a British term referring to any farmed grains. The famous (or infamous) "Corn Laws" of Great Britain had nothing to do with maize. By the way, we have hundreds of terms in English that come from Native American languages, most of them from Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, and most of them are referrents to foodstuffs. "Aguahaca," for example, gives us "avocado," and, if you add "mole" - Nahuatl for "sauce" - you get our term "guacamole," or "avocado sauce." Do you like "xocolotl?" "Chocolate" is one of our favourite adopted foods. Easy, then, to know what "tomatl' becomes in English.

 

[TxRad]

Of course I am, I did my genealogy. But here's the deal Mullet Man, my ancestors were pharoahs NOT bush bunnies, Carthaginians NOT spear chuckers. A friend of mine is as black as your heart, her people come from North Africa, too, and she does not care much for efforts to link her to the jungle jivers.

Could be your average African wandered down South, from the North, and atrophied.

If that is what you need to believe then so be it.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

I wonder how long after they used sticks weighted with perforated stones to dig they started using them to bash other people's heads in.

About a week, I figure.

Actually, they seemed to have been used for head bashing long before they were used to enhance the efficiency of digging sticks.

 

[3113]

I wonder how long after they used sticks weighted with perforated stones to dig they started using them to bash other people's heads in.

About a week, I figure.

Actually, they seemed to have been used for head bashing long before they were used to enhance the efficiency of digging sticks.

I'm with Tio. The question probably should be the other way around: How long after they started using these to bash in heads did they figure out they could use them to dig?

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Actually, they seemed to have been used for head bashing long before they were used to enhance the efficiency of digging sticks.

Dey still usin um fo head bashin.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

I'm with Tio. The question probably should be the other way around: How long after they started using these to bash in heads did they figure out they could use them to dig?

Well, stone tools seem to have first been used for foraging carrion. Plain cobbles were used to crack scavenged bones open to get at the marrow and flaked stones served to scrape bits of flesh from the surface of the bones (that was about all the other animals - lions, leopards, hyenas, vultures, etc. - left behind).

They were probably used for digging as well as part of foraging, aiding in obtaining roots and tubers from edible plants. Sticks were also likely used for that purpose, possibly before the use of stone.

The issue here isn't using stone tools for digging; that's at least 750,000 years old. The difference is these were perforated to weight digging sticks, that is, they formed a designed composite tool, and a tool that may have been used for planting seeds. Horticulturists generally make use of some form of dibble stick to make a hole in the ground for the seeds they plant, and we do constantly find that the "origin" of agriculture gets pushed back further and further in time. The earliest confirmed evidence for intentional planting is dated at more than 10,000 years ago, long before Western History's traditional "origins" in the "Fertile Crescent."

But we shouldn't stray too far from the essence of Literotica, no matter how interesting the topic may be. So, speaking of "horticulture," how about Dorothy Parker's use of the 'word' in a make-a-sentence game?
"You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think."

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Dey still usin um fo head bashin.

Some people seem to prefer brick walls for head bashing.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Some people seem to prefer brick walls for head bashing.

Youre no gladiator!

 

[TxRad]

Youre no gladiator!

Neither are you.

A 98 pound pussy has more of a chance than a 300 pound tub of lard.