Amazing stuff! Expect more discoveries with this new AI technique! It may turn out that man made and managed fire was more widespread up to 1 million years ago, then previously assumed.
"... The newly developed technique may provide a push toward a more scientific, data-driven type of archaeology, but – perhaps more importantly – it could help us better understand the origins of the human story, our most basic traditions and our experimental and innovative nature. ...
That is no coincidence, as the working theory, called the “cooking hypothesis,” is that the use of fire was instrumental in our evolution, not only for allowing hominins to stay warm, craft advanced tools and ward off predators but also for acquiring the ability to cook. Cooking meat not only eliminates pathogens but increases efficient protein digestion and nutritional value, paving the way for the growth of the brain. ...
traditional methods have managed to find widespread evidence of fire use no older than 200,000 years.
While there is some evidence of fire dating back to 500,000 years ago, it remains sparse, with only five archaeological sites around the world providing reliable evidence of ancient fire. ...
To this end, the team assessed the heat exposure of 26 flint tools found at the site almost half a century ago. The results revealed that the tools had been heated to a wide range of temperatures – some exceeding 600°C. In addition, using a different spectroscopic technique, they analyzed 87 faunal remains and discovered that the tusk of an extinct elephant also exhibited structural changes resulting from heating. ..."
That is no coincidence, as the working theory, called the “cooking hypothesis,” is that the use of fire was instrumental in our evolution, not only for allowing hominins to stay warm, craft advanced tools and ward off predators but also for acquiring the ability to cook. Cooking meat not only eliminates pathogens but increases efficient protein digestion and nutritional value, paving the way for the growth of the brain. ...
traditional methods have managed to find widespread evidence of fire use no older than 200,000 years.
While there is some evidence of fire dating back to 500,000 years ago, it remains sparse, with only five archaeological sites around the world providing reliable evidence of ancient fire. ...
To this end, the team assessed the heat exposure of 26 flint tools found at the site almost half a century ago. The results revealed that the tools had been heated to a wide range of temperatures – some exceeding 600°C. In addition, using a different spectroscopic technique, they analyzed 87 faunal remains and discovered that the tusk of an extinct elephant also exhibited structural changes resulting from heating. ..."
From the abstract:
"Pyrotechnology is a key element of hominin evolution. The identification of fire in early hominin sites relies primarily on an initial visual assessment of artifacts’ physical alterations, resulting in potential underestimation of the prevalence of fire in the archaeological record. Here, we used a suite of spectroscopic techniques to counter the absence of visual signatures for fire and demonstrate the presence of burnt fauna and lithics at the Lower Paleolithic (LP) open-air site of Evron Quarry (Israel), dated between 1.0 and 0.8 Mya and roughly contemporaneous to Gesher Benot Ya’aqov where early pyrotechnology has been documented. We propose reexamining finds from other LP sites lacking visual clues of pyrotechnology to yield a renewed perspective on the origin, evolution, and spatiotemporal dispersal of the relationship between early hominin behavior and fire use."
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