Stone tools foundย in the Philippines predate the arrival of modern humans to the islands by roughly 600,000 yearsโbut researchers arenโt sure who made them.
The eye-popping artifacts,ย unveiled on [May 2] inย Nature, were abandoned on a river floodplain on the island of Luzon beside the butchered carcass of a rhinoceros. The ancient toolmakers were clearly angling for a meal. Two of the rhino’s limb bones are smashed in, as if someone was trying to harvest and eat the marrow inside. Cut marks left behind by stone blades crisscross the rhino’s ribs and ankle, a clear sign that someone used tools to strip the carcass of meat.
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The next-earliest evidence of Philippine hominins comes from Luzon’s Callao Cave, in the form ofย a 67,000-year-old foot bone.
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While the researchers don’t know which archaic cousin of ours butchered the rhino, the find will likely cause a stir among people studying the human story in the South Pacificโespecially those wondering how early hominins got to the Philippines in the first place.
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The list of possible toolmakers includes the Denisovans, a ghost lineage of hominins known from DNA and a handful of Siberian fossils. The leading candidate, though, is the early homininย Homo erectus,ย since it definitely made its way into southeast Asia.
Read full, original post:ย 700,000-Year-Old Stone Tools Point to Mysterious Human Relative
