Tuesday, September 26, 2023

The oldest woden structure built by humans is almost half a million years old

That's longer than Homo Sapiens Sapiens has been around:

The well-preserved remains of a wooden structure that is no less than 476,000 years old, pre-dating the appearance of Homo sapiens by 100,000, have been discovered at Kalambo Falls in Zambia. Two logs were found in an interlocking position, joined by an intentionally cut notch. Early hominins whittled, shaped and stacked timbers into an unidentified structure that may have been a shelter, a raised track, a fishing platform or something else entirely.

That's really, really old.  And it's wood, not stone.

4 comments:

matism said...

Wakanda, baby!

Aesop said...

But, it was built in Africa, so of course it fell over.

jabrwok said...

Sleestacks!

Jonathan H said...

I'd like to see lots more details on their analysis - if you look into dating, pretty much all methods lose integrity well before then or have other major problems.
I wouldn't be surprised to also see pressure from the host country to date as early as possible as bragging rights; many countries in that area are more concerned about reputation and bragging rights than truth, unfortunately.
Jonathan