US EditionEarliest Evidence of Human Fire-Making Discovered in England
Fire evidence includes a hearth, heat-shattered tools, and rare iron pyrite fragments indicating controlled fire-making 350,000 years earlier than previously known, researchers said.
- Published on December 10, the British Museum-led study in Nature reports fire-making evidence at Barnham, Suffolk over 400,000 years ago, pushing the timeline back 350,000 years.
- Researchers have long debated whether early hominins made fire or captured wildfires, complicating interpretation amid sparse, ambiguous evidence despite traces as early as 1.5 million years and Neanderthal claims around 40,000 years ago.
- At Barnham, excavators uncovered heated clay, heat-shattered flint handaxes, and two fragments of iron pyrite, while laboratory analyses show repeated heating above 700°C and pyrite transport.
- Study authors say intentional fire-making enabled cooking, improving nutrition and brain growth, but no hominin remains were found, so early Neanderthals or Homo heidelbergensis are plausible candidates.
- Some reviewers noted the lack of direct spark scars on pyrite and flint, while independent archaeologists called the evidence compelling amid rising European Paleolithic fire use around 400,000 years ago.
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UK: Flint tools found in Suffolk in hint that ancient ancestors created their own flames 400,000 years ago
Some of history's most important inventions can be credited to the British, from the steam engine to the World Wide Web. Now, research places one of the world's most profound discoveries on our shores - the creation of fire. A team of scientists led by the British Museum has unearthed the earliest known evidence of fire making, dating back over 400,000 years, in a field in Suffolk. The discovery consists of a patch of heated clay, heat-shattered…
Some 400,000 years ago, in what is now the East of England, a group of Neanderthals used flint and pyrite to light bonfires next to a trough. And not only on one occasion, but again and again, over several generations. That is the conclusion of a study published on Wednesday in Nature magazine. Previously, the oldest known evidence that humans set fire dated back to only 50,000 years ago. The new finding indicates that this key step in human his…
Found the oldest tools used to ignite fire: they are two fragments of mineral pyrite dating back to 400,000 years ago, found next to the remains of outbreaks in the United Kingdom (ANSA)
A new find in eastern England shows that humans may have been making fire much earlier than previously thought, reports the BBC. Scientists believe they have found a fireplace that was used as long as 400,000 years ago.
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