Archaeologists have discovered Olduvai-type stone tools in Kenya, the approximate age of which is 3.03 – 2.6 million years. They are older than the entire genus Homo, which appeared regarding 2.6 million years ago. Our species, Homo sapiens, is thought to have evolved regarding 200,000 years ago. So the creators of the found tools were not people, and even, it seems, the direct ancestors of people. He writes regarding it on February 19 Forbes.
Near the objects, teeth of Paranthropus were found – hominids, which are distant relatives of humans, but not ancestors. Before there was no proof that Paranthropus made tools.
Excavations at the Nyayanga site in Kenya have been going on for several years. 330 artifacts, 1776 animal bones and two hominin teeth were found. The inhabitants of Nyayanga used their tools quite ingeniously, processing, judging by the traces of wear, both soft parts of plants (leaves or fruits) and hard parts (roots and tubers). Animal bones (including three hippopotamuses) suggest that regular hominins ate meat from large animals. But raw – there are no traces of fire.
The oldest known stone tools were found in 2015 in Kenya at the Lomekwi 3 site, they are 3.3 million years old.
