Earlier Stone Age Artifacts Discovered in Northern Cape of South Africa

First Posted: Jul 25, 2014 04:27 AM EDT

A team of archaeologists have unearthed several Earlier Stone Age artifacts, from a site in Northern Cape Province of South Africa.

Nearly tens of thousands of Earlier Stone Age artifacts were discovered by archaeologists from the University of Cape Town, South African and University of Toronto in collaboration with McGregor Museum in Kimberley. The Earlier Stone Age artifacts such as hand axes and other tools were unearthed from the Kathu Townlands site that is estimated to be 700,000-1 million years old.

Listed as one of the richest early prehistoric archaeological site, Kathu is a major iron mining centre. This site is - located in the midst of zone of intensive development - poses a unique challenge to the archaeologists and developers to look for strategies to work.

Steven James Walker from the Department of Archaeology at UCT is the lead author of the journal paper. He said: "The site is amazing and it is threatened. We've been working well with developers as well as the South African Heritage Resources Agency to preserve it, but the town of Kathu is rapidly expanding around the site. It might get cut off on all sides by development and this would be regrettable."

The site where the artifacts were discovered was just one component of all prehistoric sites - called the Kathu Complex. Other sites include Kathy Pan 1, where fossilized remains of elephants and hippos were unearthed including the earliest evidence of tools that were used such as spears.

Michael Chazan, Director of the Archaeology Centre at University of Toronto said, "We need to imagine a landscape around Kathu that supported large populations of human ancestors, as well as large animals like hippos. All indications suggest that Kathu was much wetter, maybe more like the Okavango than the Kalahari. There is no question that the Kathu Complex presents unique opportunities to investigate the evolution of human ancestors in Southern Africa."

The finding was documented in the journal PLOS One.

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