Perhaps we appeared even more recently? Archaeological evidence seems
to show an acceleration in technological change in Europe and Russia about
50,000 years ago. Improved stone tools appeared, as did new materials
including bone and skins. Cave paintings and carved objects provide
evidence of symbolic thought. Some specialists argue that this “Revolution
of the Upper Paleolithic” proves that even if Homo sapiens evolved earlier,
modern human behaviors appeared only 50,000 years ago, perhaps as a
result of tiny changes in the wiring of the brain. If this is correct, then the
critical threshold may have been crossed—and human history would have
begun—just 50,000 years ago.
I am not a paleontologist, but recent work by two paleontologists, Sally
McBrearty and Alison Brooks, has convinced me that the good money is on
the “Out of Africa” hypothesis. So, with a warning that opinion could change
if new evidence appears, I will argue in the rest of this course that human
history really begins between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago, somewhere in
Africa. What’s the evidence for this conclusion?
McBrearty and Brooks argue that the “Revolution of the Upper Paleolithic”
is an illusion, created simply because much more archaeology has been done
in Europe than in Africa. Their detailed survey of the scanty archaeological
evidence from Africa suggests that the technologies that appear in the Upper
Paleolithic had already evolved in Africa. From almost 300,000 years ago,
new technologies, and even hints of symbolic activity (such as the use of
ocher), appear in association with a new hominine species, Homo helmei,
which they regard as an early version of Homo sapiens. Blombos cave in
South Africa offers a good illustration. It was occupied from 70,000 years
ago. Its inhabitants used ocher (presumably to paint their bodies) and made
¿ ne stone tools. They used shell¿ sh and may have ¿ shed.
The details of how our species evolved remain unclear, but currently the bet
is on a rapid appearance of modern humans about 200,000 to 300,000 years
ago, somewhere in eastern or southern Africa. The next lecture asks: How
did the ¿ rst humans live during the earliest phase of human history—the
Paleolithic era? Ŷ