Caves and fire were two of early man's greatest assets. Photo by VasGian/CC.
HAIFA, Israel, Dec. 15 (UPI) -- Archaeologists, historians and evolutionary biologists have long tried to affix the development of humans to various technological milestones -- tool-making, the wheel, fire, agriculture, writing. But pinning down the exact date and timeline of these watershed moments is exceedingly difficult. The advent of the regular use of fire has been particularly difficult to finger.
But researchers say an ancient cave in Israel offers proof that humans had mastered the use of fire by roughly 350,000 years ago. The advent is early enough that it can explain the development of certain aspects of human culture and behavior, but it's too late to account for expansion of the human brain or human colonization of colder climes.
The Tabun Cave is unique in that it boasts more than 500,000 years of continual use by modern humans -- offering a time-lapse video of human development. By examining layers of flint deposits in the cave (as well as previously excavated flint tools), researchers were able to show that only after 350,000 years ago did flint show signs of regular exposure to fire.
"Tabun Cave is unique in that it's a site with a very long sequence," study author Ron Shimelmitz, an archaeologist at Israel's University of Haifa, explained to Science Magazine. "We could examine step by step how the use of fire changed in the cave."
The new study confirms the findings of a survey compiled in 2011 by researchers at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History. That survey looked at the litany of fire related studies and found that the majority of reliable research put the advent of fire between 300,000 and 400,000 years ago. A select few archaeological sites show earlier signs of fire, but they are few and far between -- and many of them are based on evidence that's difficult to interpret and date.
Despite the quality of their evidence and logic, Shimelmitz and his colleagues know that their research is unlikely to put an end to the debate over man's inaugural control of fire. Prominent prehistorians continue to insist that fire -- and humans' ability to cook food -- is responsible for early man's smaller teeth, downsized intestinal systems and larger brains, traits developed some two million years ago.
Schimelmitz says that whenever fire was first controlled, it was quite the asset -- providing warmth, light, safety, and cooked food.
The latest research on the advent of fire was published Monday in the Journal of Human Evolution.
