Early humans were quarrying stone as far back as 220,000 years ago, revealing surprisingly advanced planning and resource use.

Long before cities or farms, the earliest humans were standing in a changing northern Kenyan landscape, striking stone to stone with steady hands. Their world was noisy with wind, heat, wildfires, and ...

For decades, textbooks painted a dramatic picture of early humans as tool-using hunters who rose quickly to the top of the food chain. The tale was that Homo habilis, one of the earliest ...

Our prehistoric human ancestors relied on deliberately modified and sharpened stone tools as early as 3.3 million years ago. The selection of rock type depended on how easily the material could be ...

The Nyayanga excavation site in Kenya, in July 2025. Fossils and Oldowan tools have been excavated from the tan and reddish-brown sediments, which date to more than 2.6 million years old. T. W.

It's easy to take for granted that with the flick of a lighter or the turn of a furnace knob, modern humans can conjure flames — cooking food, lighting candles or warming homes. For much of our ...