Earliest Footprints Outside Africa Discovered in Norfolk

Scientists have discovered the earliest evidence of human footprints outside of Africa, on the Norfolk Coast in the East of England.

The footprints are more than 800,000 years old and were found on the shores of Happisburgh.

They are direct evidence of the earliest known humans in northern Europe.

Details of the extraordinary markings have been published in the science journal Plos One..

Earliest Footprints Outside Africa Discovered in Norfolk

Wow - 800,000 year old Footprints found in Norfolk, UK!

Apparently, these are the oldest known Hominid footprints found anywhere except in Africa and sheds some light on the spread of early Hominids. This follows another recent discovery of Tools at the same site (another article here)

They have supposed these may have been the earliest Humans to have worn clothing, although it is not known if they had use of fire.

reply to post by stumason


This post was wrong and is now oftopic, sorry about that

reply to post by Mianeye


The news article mistakenly states that the sea has washed them away but they are in rock. The sea has covered them over in sand again, as the chap from the British Museum states in the video. So, they're still there, just not visible anymore.

What I find amazing, and slightly odd, is that the British Museum guy and his colleague just happened to be walking along the beach and spotted these footprints in the rock on the very rare occasion that they were uncovered! Very, very lucky.

reply to post by iskander683

Yes, just saw the video in Gortex thread, it's a wrong discription in the article.

In that case it's a nice find and a very lucky one.

I will edit the post above as it's not needed

Edit to below: I was to quick and only read the article, i will stand in shame in a corner for a minute or two

reply to post by Mianeye


To be fair to the OP, his link also has a video, if not the same one, and he managed to get in before Gortex!!

reply to post by Mianeye


Um... no.

If you look at the substance in which these prints had been left, you would see that it is not a sandy or muddy substance, but some form of rock, probably sedimentary in nature. That is to say, that when the prints were left, the substance was indeed soft enough to take an impression of homnid feet, but hardened between then and now, preserving the print. It is likely that this area, which is currently part of the shoreline, was not shoreline when the impressions were left, but something similar to a wetland.

The prints were probably located on a slab of sedimentary rock which was at imminent risk of being broken down after hundreds of thousands of years in place. I do not think that the researchers involved would have been stupid enough to believe that prints left in loose, damp sand, would have survived for all that time!

reply to post by TrueBrit


Wouldn't it have made sense to just cut the stone up and take it away for preservation?

reply to post by Thorneblood


It might not have been an option on the day.

If this discovery was made on the fly, so to speak, then the good people who found the prints might not have had the cutting machinery necessary to do as you suggest, on hand at the time. On the other hand, it might be that they were of the opinion that there might be another chance to study these prints at a later stage, in their original position, when the tidal forces allow for it. I am not sure about that, since I am not an expert on the hydrodynamics at play in the region.

I am sure however, that if they had been expecting to come across something so important as these foot prints, they would have been better prepared to evaluate them with more rigor and with less haste than they had to in the event.

reply to post by iskander683


Was this about the old chestnut "It's posted here already"?

If so, "da rulz" says there can be a Breaking News and another thread of the same topic concurrently....

But yes, I did beat Gortex

reply to post by stumason


If you look in the vid the cliff face behind looks quite high, a few hundred years ago that cloff face would have been further out to see and covering those prints. So it seems to me that they would have to be alot older than what they say to have been that deep down in the first place? Im no expert , just a thought.

reply to post by Lompyt


Good question - deserves an answer...

Don't forget the Ice Ages, which would have lowered the Sea level sufficiently that this may not have even been a coastline at all, I believe it was an estuary in fact. Sea levels were low enough during the Ice ages that much of the North Sea was in fact rolling hills and valleys.

reply to post by TrueBrit


The article said they worked over the course of two weeks, just seems like a terrible loss and lord knows what they could have found buried in or beneath the rock where the footprints were.

reply to post by Thorneblood


Well as I understand it, the location from which the footprints were recorded, is being covered up by sand. Perhaps there will be future opportunities to study the site? I hope so.

Scientists have a vested interest in proclaiming new finds as authentic so as to secure funds. The second problem is that few scientists know anything about tracks or tracking. There has been a fair amount of work done on dinosaur trackways but early hominid trackways are few and far between.

What they present is a random series of depressions they believe are the tracks of an adult and a child. There is no progression of what would constitute a normal pair of tracks even if they were searching the ground for something. If someone were walking on substrate soft enough to leave such deep impressions there should be a trail of paired foot impressions, stepping here, turning there and sometimes stepping on their own tracks as one would normally do if walking in such a confined area.

I don't see evidence of paired humanoid tracks in the pictures they provide. They may be getting very excited over what might turn out to be nothing more than mollusk traces or tracks of a different type of animal that became distorted due to any number of weather-related factors. Lacking a logical progression of footfalls or any detailing such as toes, skin textures or signs that are known among those who study tracking as pressure releases which indicate direction or speed I think the evidence is far from conclusive. Interesting, but not definitive.

reply to post by Asktheanimals


I have to say i am not convinced either but then "footprints" never particularly convince me. Erosion causes some pretty weird and wonderful shapes all on its own.

If true and can be corroborated then this is truly fantastic and interesting but finding that corroborating evidence will not be easy. Aside from anything, that part of the country will have suffered pretty badly from glacial meltwater over an 800'000 year period.

It may be true though as they say it is an unknown human group - it may explain the propensity of webbed feet and six fingers in that part of the world.......

But but but but.....


Ken Ham said the other day in the debate that the earth is only 4,000 years old.... how can there be 800,000 year old foot prints????


I am so confused!!!!!!!!!!!!


NOT

reply to post by stumason


lol the footprints are 10,000 years old.

Thorneblood
reply to post by TrueBrit

 

Wouldn't it have made sense to just cut the stone up and take it away for preservation?

edit on 7-2-2014 by Thorneblood because: (no reason given)

if the footprints are 800,000 years old, your comment about
cutting the stone out and removing it for preservation is funny.

reply to post by Flavian


I only replied because I've spent 25 years learning tracking and working in search and rescue. Weather can do very strange things to tracks, enough so to make people think raccoon tracks somehow belonged to a lost child - I kid you not. That was an example of frost heave which tends to make tracks appear much larger than actual size. I've also had the fun of trying to decipher Cretaceous era tracks in Texas in a streambed. I was trying to follow what I thought were a set of unrecorded tracks only to discover they were pockets swirled out by the action of a pebble caught in a depression. Positive identification of tracks can get a bit hairy and even experienced trackers can get fooled.

The good news is if these are authentic the tracks are safe where they are. They've lasted 800,000 years in that spot a few more wont hurt them at all. It's just a pain in the butt to have to remove all the sand every time they want to study them.

OMG WHO in their right mind would believe this Obvious HOAX story?

These were caused by rain wind and erosion - no footprints here, move along folks-

The article say's,

The markings were first indentified in May last year during a low tide. Rough seas had eroded the sandy beach to reveal a series of elongated hollows.

And it was raining -

Dr Ashton recalls how they scooped out rainwater from the footprints so that they could be photographed. "But the rain was filling the hollows as quickly as we could empty them,"

and also says,

The hollows were washed away not long after they were identified.

So, in wind, rain, erosion and in SAND you expect me to believe these hollows were made 800,000 years ago and just happened to stand the test of time for 800,000 years up until the moment they were discovered - then they promptly got washed away !?? You gotta be the stupidest man on earth to believe that.

This sounds like a guy who wanted grant money, publicity or both. This is an Obvious Hoax - half of ATS can see that, it only takes half a brain. LOL