Between 2.5 and 1.3 million years ago, hominids developed a culture known as the Oldowan, characterized by a highly efficient lithic industry. Some of the Oldowan technologies persisted until the Neolithic period. The tools were crafted on a pebble support using uni-, bi-, or multidirectional removals to create choppers, chopping tools, or polyhedras. The flakes obtained during knapping, which are rarely retouched, can also be utilized as tools.

HOMO ERGASTER TURKANA BOY
(Nariokotome’s child)
Turkana Boy, discovered in 1984 by Kamoya Kimeu, a member of Richard Leakey’s team, was found at Nariokotome, near Lake Turkana in Kenya. Estimated to be 1.6 million years old, he is believed to have died at the age of 12. As an adult, he would have stood at 1.85 meters tall.

THE FIRE The use or domestication of fire is evident from the presence of built hearths or carbonized remains. While the use of fire by Homo Habilis is debated, it is undeniable that Homo Erectus had mastered its use approximately 500,000 years ago. Around the hearth that facilitates cooking, provides illumination, and offers warmth, a social structure emerges conducive to the development of cultural traditions and the transmission of knowledge and expertise. (Sources of the maps according to Dominique Grimaud et al; 2017)

The Acheulean
The Lower Paleolithic period follows the Archaic or Oldowan Paleolithic and encompasses various cultural facies. The Acheulean culture in particular stands out. It is characterized by the use of bifaces and cleavers as distinctive tools. Comparable in duration to the Oldowan, where it has its roots in the Acheulean culture (1.7 million years ago, at about 200,000 years ago) and is a pivotal period between relatively rudimentary stone-cutting processes and an increasingly elaborate lithic industry.   Two tools that represent the Acheulean industry are bifaces, which are stone tools cut on both sides. They can take various shapes, such as almond-shaped, lanceolate, oval, or triangular. When viewed from the side, the edges of bifaces appear sinuous when they have been cut or hammered in stone, while they become straight when hammered with a wooden hammer. Bifaces were used for cutting, fleshing prey, and incidentally for scraping skins and working wood.   The cleaver is a massive tool with a transverse cutting edge formed by the intersection of two planes: the burst surface plane and one of the planes of the upper face or the natural surface of the pebble. This cutting edge is always natural, meaning it’s free of any secondary retouching. Sometimes, one or two retouched edges are added laterally to limit the cleaver’s shape. Cleavers were most commonly made on flakes, while pebbles were rarely used.