1.9-million- and 2.4-million-year-old artifacts and stone tool–cutmarked bones from Ain Boucherit, Algeria

• DOI: 10.1126/science.aau0008
• Publication Date: 2018-11-30T00:15:14Z
• Authors: Mohamed Sahnouni; Josep M. Parés; Mathieu Duval; Isabel Cáceres; Zoheir Harichane; Jan van der Made; Alfredo Pérez-Gon...; Salah Abdessadok; Nadia Kandi; Abdelkader Derradji; Mohamed Medig; Kamel Boulaghraif; Sileshi Semaw
• Keywords: Stone tool; Stone Age; Out of africa; Paleoanthropology; Artifact (error); Flake

East Africa has provided the earliest known evidence for Oldowan stone artifacts and hominin-induced tool cutmarks dated to ~2.6 million years (Ma) ago. The ~1.8-million-year-old from Ain Hanech (Algeria) were considered represent oldest archaeological materials in North Africa. Here we report older cutmarked bones excavated two nearby deposits at Boucherit estimated ~1.9 Ma ago, ~2.4 Hence, shows that ancestral hominins inhabited Mediterranean fringe northern much earlier than previously thought. strongly argues early dispersal of manufacture use or a possible multiple-origin scenario technology both