The oldest bone tools ever discovered for making clothes, 120,000 years old, have been unearthed in a cave near Rabat, we learned from a Moroccan archaeologist who took part in the research.
“This is a major discovery, because if older bone tools have already been discovered in the world, it is the first time that we identify bone tools used to make clothes,” explained Thursday to AFP archaeologist Abdeljalil El Hajraoui.
The sixty or so bone tools found in the Smugglers’ Cave – located near the kingdom’s capital – “were intentionally shaped for specific tasks that included working with leather and fur,” according to a study released last week by the journal iScience.
This discovery could help answer the big question about the origin of modern behavior in Homo sapiens, underlines the Moroccan archaeologist.
The oldest bone tools ever discovered for making clothes, 120,000 years old, have been unearthed in a cave near Rabat, we learned from a Moroccan archaeologist who took part in the research .
“This is a major discovery, because if older bone tools have already been discovered in the world, it is the first time that we identify bone tools used to make clothes,” explained Thursday to AFP archaeologist Abdeljalil El Hajraoui.
The sixty or so bone tools found in the Smugglers’ Cave – located near the kingdom’s capital – “were intentionally shaped for specific tasks that included working with leather and fur,” according to a study released last week by the journal iScience.
This discovery could help answer the big question about the origin of modern behavior in Homo sapiens, underlines the Moroccan archaeologist.
“Sewing is a behavior that has been perpetuated since those times. Moreover, the tools discovered in the cave were used for 30,000 years, which would prove the emergence of collective memory”, supports the specialist of the Moroccan Institute of Archaeological and Heritage Sciences (INSAP).
“Taking into account the level of specialization of the tools of the smugglers cave, it is probable that previous examples will be found there”, specifies the study.
Hearths, dug in the earth, built or in the open air, to protect against natural phenomena were also discovered in the cave. Just like elements of adornment (perforated shells). “This is a significant cultural development, still at the study stage,” notes the Moroccan researcher.
In addition, some 400 km from the Smugglers’ cave, Moroccan, American and French researchers have unearthed around thirty shells fashioned from marine snails in a layer dating from 142,000 to 150,000 years ago in the cave of Bizmoune near Paris. Essaouira (south-east), a press release from the Moroccan Ministry of Culture announced on Wednesday, citing a study published in the American journal Science Advances.
Shells which are “the oldest pieces of adornment discovered to date”, according to the press release.
At the end of July, international archaeologists located the oldest Acheulean in North Africa, a prehistoric human who lived 1.3 million years ago, on the outskirts of Casablanca.
A major discovery because until now archaeologists estimated that the Acheulean civilization, one of the characteristics of which is the invention of two-sided tools, during the Lower Paleolithic, had appeared 700,000 years ago in this part of north Africa.
