Stone Axes Up To 1.5 Million Years Old Find In Iraq
Date
1/30/2025 3:15:15 PM
(MENAFN- AzerNews)
By Alimat Aliyeva
Belgian scientists from the Free University of Brussels (VUB)
have announced the results of an expedition in the Iraqi Western
Desert, where the team discovered stone tools that could be up to
1.5 million years old, Azernews reports.
The archaeologists focused their research in the Al-Shabaka
region, an area once home to a large Pleistocene-era lake that has
since dried up, leaving behind ancient riverbeds crisscrossing the
landscape.
During the excavation, the team uncovered seven Paleolithic
sites from both the Early and Middle Paleolithic periods.
More than 850 artifacts were found in the surface layer of the
region, including hand axes dating back to the Early Paleolithic
(approximately 1.5 million years ago) and Levallois flakes, which
range from 300,000 to 40,000 years old. These Levallois flakes are
thin stone plates known for their precision, used by ancient humans
for intricate tasks.
“These findings offer us valuable insight into how early humans
utilized the landscape and adapted to changing climates,” explained
Ella Egberts, the leader of the expedition.
The discovery in Iraq is significant not only for its age but
also for its geographic location. The Middle East is often
considered a "cradle" of early human development, and this finding
could help researchers further understand the migration patterns of
early humans as they moved out of Africa and spread across the
globe.
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