Earliest Evidence of Human Hunting Found (earliest to date found..my add)

www.livescience.com...
If you believe the earth has only been around for 6000 years I suggest you do not waste your time reading or commenting

Animal bones and thousands of stone tools used by ancient hominins suggest that early human ancestors were butchering and scavenging animals at least 2 million years ago. The findings, published April 25 in the journal PLOS ONE, support the idea that ancient meat eating might have fueled big changes in Homo species at that time.

"Just about that time — 2 million years ago — we see big shifts in the human fossil record of increase in brain size, increase in body size and hominins leaving Africa for Eurasia," said study co-author Joseph Ferraro, an archaeologist at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. The meaty meals may have provided the energy for those transformations, he said.

In addition, "we find cut marks on their bones where crude stone tools were used to de-flesh the animal and to remove their meat and their organs," Ferraro told LiveScience.

The human brain is an incredibly expensive organ, It takes up only about 2 percent of the body's mass yet uses more than a fifth of the body's energy; seems to be what I have been told...... I have seen people starving where the brain is just about shut down so I tend to agree about the brain being the bodies comsumption queen......I remember articles saying it was the consumption of meat that enabled our brain growth.....I was not there; that is what the science seems to indicate.

The out-of-Africa hypothesis maintains that modern humans evolved in Africa and then spread around the world, replacing existing populations of archaic humans. However, there is a "multiregional hypothesis" that basically says modern humans evolved over a broad area from archaic humans, the populations in different regions mated with their neighbors causing isolated traits; wal-la the diversity of modern humans in all their colors and body shapes.

The out-of-Africa hypothesis currently holds the lead, but proponents of the multiregional hypothesis remains a strong vocal minority. Either one of the hypothesis works in certain ways but the science is not complete IMO Maybe as more and more discoveries are made the scales will tip once and for all toward a definitive answer..

For those who look at such things we have all found out Chimps will kill and eat certain things like monkeys but it is not a daily chore which appears to be more of a male bonding rite amoung the troop...my opinion....

If our ancestors at this stage of development could hunt and kill larger game as the article appears to imply then they were possibly drying the meat and maybe cooking it...That would have been a simple transition IMO...a big grassland fire and animals get killed and roasted...Man find fresh killed Rabbit (sorry Wrabbit) and tries a bite or two...hummm better than raw...many things in the past that I think would be neat to see as a time traveling pair of eyeballs....

reply to post by 727Sky


Terrific find. I wander if they found any hominid remains, ie was it homo erectus? Was this a grassland or forested area? That makes a difference also to bipedals hunting . Bookmarked to read more on the weekend

reply to post by zazzafrazz

Among the finds were dozens of goat-size gazelles. Most of the bones were found on-site, suggesting their carcasses were brought whole to the site.

Would imply to me it was a grassland...

So far, however, the researchers have found no traces of the hominins who hunted those animals.

Although researchers aren't exactly sure who these human ancestors were, they certainly walked upright and were adapted to living on the grassland — possibly H. erectus or its immediate predecessor, Ferraro said.

Long long ago many cultures did not bury their dead so it may be harder to find a burial sight but, it is a big world out there so sooner or later maybe something will turn up.

Thanks for the reply

First of all, most people do not believe that the earth is only six thousand years old. Second thing is that humanoids are known to be around for a very long time, and their DNA is incorporated into most of us, meaning that some of our ancestors are very ancient. Modern Humans have only been on this earth for a short time, maybe sixty to a hundred thousand years or so. That is what I have read anyway, whether this is truth is unknown, just because the earliest evidence we have so far of modern humans is less than a hundred thousand years, it actually only means we have lack of evidence before that time, it does not mean they are not a lot older.

Lack of proven evidence cannot be used to prove something is not real, that is not true science.

To say that mankind is only six thousand years old as a few still believe is not science either, there is evidence that proves that we are older.

I am a stickler for interpretating evidence correctly, especially limiting things by lack of evidence. To me, I can say something I know to be true, mankind has been on this planet for a long time, and some of our ancestors have been on this planet for a very long time, we have genetics of some very old humanoids in us.

reply to post by 727Sky


Fascinating stuff,
The transition to eating meat was a huge advancement for humans.
At two million years ago it could have been homo habilis or an astrolopithicine, I doubt it was hjomo erectus, as I belive HE evolved in Eurasia from homo georgicus and then migrated back to africa.

reply to post by 727Sky


Excellent report, thanks

That was an interesting point about the larger animal heads but I would add that even if the larger animals could not crack the skull the smaller ones could enter the brain by way of the ears, eyes, nose and atlanto-occipital joint. Probably within a few hours of the creatures death. Its possible that man made a business of following larger predators and grabbing what was left once the larger beast was satisfied.

reply to post by Hanslune


Possibly...Or go to sleep at your camp and wake up and scan the skies for buzzards circling...This method is still used today...Find the birds over a fresh kill and you got a meal..No doubt everything and anything was used to procure a meal of some sort.

reply to post by 727Sky


Good find OP. S & F

I for one believe the Earth is older than 6,000 years. I do think it's older than 6,000, and I don't think 10,000 or 25,000 years older either. Pretty much believe it's the 4 billion they tell us it is.

I'm not a scientist by any means, it just "feels" logical.

reply to post by 727Sky


As an aside, In the Americas, Colorado, there has recently been found evidence for human hunting from 100,000 years ago... well, maybe 60,000 ...can't remember off hand, but either way, older than anything else so far found there.

I got the info from a Nova titled "Ice Age Death Trap" and the evidence is darn good.

www.njtvonline.org...

Originally posted by Baddogma
reply to post by 727Sky

 

As an aside, In the Americas, Colorado, there has recently been found evidence for human hunting from 100,000 years ago... well, maybe 60,000 ...can't remember off hand, but either way, older than anything else so far found there.

I got the info from a Nova titled "Ice Age Death Trap" and the evidence is darn good.

www.njtvonline.org...

Being out of country the video is blocked-unable to view- at my location...but thanks for the post will try to view back in the states....

reply to post by 727Sky


Just look for any PBS Nova outlet, or even Youtube... called Ice Age Death Trap and the short version is they found an ancient muck trap with hundreds of bones of mega fauna.

One mammoth in particular, dated at 100,000 b.p. had cut marks and weigh stones, usually used by hunters to hold their kill down under water to preserve it. Other bones showed signs of cutting, too.

The only reason there was controversy was the old age... otherwise the signs of man were common ones.

reply to post by Baddogma


Thanks for posting the link to the nova program, will watch it tonite.
The mention of possible human hunting, reminded me of something.
While researching the calico hills site in the Mojave desert, www.calicodig.org... I came across a discussion on a point collectors forum, by someone who had worked with the extremely controversial lithics found there. A piece of stone deemed a geofact, from a layer more than 100 k years old, turned out to be a very specific type of chert, that is only found in Colorado, not to far from this mammoth site.

reply to post by punkinworks10


Howdy Punkinworks10 that link doesn't seem to be working

reply to post by Hanslune


Hey Hans
This should be better,

www.calicodig.org...

Originally posted by Baddogma
reply to post by 727Sky

 

As an aside, In the Americas, Colorado, there has recently been found evidence for human hunting from 100,000 years ago... well, maybe 60,000 ...can't remember off hand, but either way, older than anything else so far found there.

I got the info from a Nova titled "Ice Age Death Trap" and the evidence is darn good.

www.njtvonline.org...

Hi there,
I watched the doc, it's pretty darn good.
That fossil bed is very productive, it has an analogy to the fairmead beds here in central cal.

And that bit towards the end is VERY PROVOCATIVE.

A peat bog with no stones in, has the front half of a mammoth with stones intermixed with it.
Stones where there is no geological explanation for their presence.
A mammoth front half, it's only the front half nothing else, in a peat bog with rocks , just how paleo Indians stored meat n a meat cache.
AND a fragment of a rib that has cut marks on it, not knaw marks but deep sharp v shaped , straight and parallel, marks on one side of the bone. Knawing uses two tools, upper and lower jaws, and leaves marks all over the bone.

Very very provocative.
It's a shame the site is lost now, but I would wager their is a camp site nearby waiting to be discovered.

Also why are there no predators present in the assemblage?

reply to post by punkinworks10


Yes, I found the evidence to be excellent and the date, though very controversial, to be completely convincing. And that date pushes the timeline back several tens of thousands of years for man to be in the Americas, yet also consistent with the "ignored" "anomalous" finds... which means they aren't actually anomalous.

It's really no big surprise to most people who have an open mind and know about the "hoaxes" and odd finds of bones and artifacts that point to far older human activity. Maybe the hoaxes that damage the official timeline aren't all hoaxes.

No real reason to be surprised by an earlier presence of modern-ish man.

reply to post by Baddogma

I'll admit I was skeptical, when I first started watching the vid, that it would be a sensationalistic type show, but it wasn't at all.

The covered the work at the site quite well and balanced, the producers making no presumptive judgements.

t was all pretty matter of fact through out most of it, until the peat bog mammoth.
It's pretty hard to discount what they have found, and the level of expertise among the researchers is top notch.
What is funny is how you could tell they knew what they had found but nobody is willing to admit it.

Here is an experiment on duplicating a meat cache.

Text Fisher's experiments to test the viability of underwater meat preservation began in 1989 in the U-M's E.S. George Reserve near Hell, Mich. From autumn to mid-winter Fisher anchored legs of lamb and venison on the bottom of a shallow,open-water pond and buried other meat sections in a nearby peat bog. Caches were left in place for up to two years and checked periodically for decomposition.

"The meat remained essentially fresh for most of the first winter," Fisher said. "By spring, progressive discoloration had developed on the outside, but interior tissue looked and smelled reasonably fresh. "

The combination of cold water temperature and increased acidity in the meat produced by pond bacteria called lactobacilli,which can survive without oxygen, made the meat unpalatable to other bacteria that normally decompose dead tissue, according to Fisher.Laboratory analyses of meat retrieved from the pond and bog in April 1992 showed no significant pathogens and bacterial counts were comparable to levels found in control samples Fisher stored in his home freezer.

On Feb. 13, 1993, the body of a 28-year-old draft horse,which died the previous day of natural causes, was donated to Fisher for use in his research. Using simple stone tools he made himself and replicating techniques documented at mastodon excavation sites, Fisher and two colleagues butchered the horse and placed sections of meat in the pond through a hole chopped in the ice. ''The stone tools were very effective,'' Fisher said. ''For some procedures,especially the skinning process, they worked better than steel knives.''

Fisher monitored the condition of the meat at two-week intervals throughout the following summer. "As long as ice remained on the pond, the meat stayed essentially fresh,'' Fisher said. "By June, the meat had developed a strong smelland sour taste, but still retained considerable nutritive value. "

ns.umich.edu...

reply to post by Baddogma


Finally got to see the vid thanks!

reply to post by 727Sky


Good and just wanted to post to say your avatar is one of my favs... heh...