The Modern Human May Have Emerged 71,000 Years Ago Early Tools Suggest

Microlith tools that emerged in a South African archaeological dig have been dated back 71,000 years, implying the dawn of the "modern human" goes back further than anyone had ever thought, reports the Wall Street Journal.

Scientists confirmed that the newly discovered blades were crafted from heat-treated stone, which suggests that the evolution of the human brain accelerated 10,000 years before previously hypothesized.   

Arizona State University Paleoanthropologist Curtis Marean explains, "What it's showing us is that these people were like you and I."

She adds, '"When Africans left Africa and entered Neanderthal territory, they had projectiles with greater killing reach, and these early moderns probably also had higher levels of pro-social, hyper-cooperative behavior. These two traits were a knockout punch. Combine them, as modern humans did and still do, and no prey or competitor is safe. This probably laid the foundation for the expansion out of Africa of modern humans and the extinction of many prey as well as our sister species such as Neanderthals."

These tools persisted for 11,000 years, which is "an almost unimaginable time span for people to make tools the same way. This is certainly not a flickering pattern," says the paleoanthropologist. Scientists believe that early humans mounted microliths on weapons, granting them a strategic advantage against prey.

University of Connecticut Archeologist Sally McBrearty states, "The [newly discovered] date for the microliths will cause some adjustment in thinking."

Marean notes that "every time we excavate a new site in Coastal South Africa with advanced field techniques, we discover new and surprising results that push back in time the evidence for uniquely human behaviors."

The study was originally published in the scientific journal Nature.