Hidden signatures of early fire at Evron Quarry (1.0 to 0.8 Mya)

Zane Stepka; Ido Azuri; Liora Kolska Horwitz; Michael Chazan; Filipe Natalio

doi:10.1073/pnas.2123439119

Hidden signatures of early fire at Evron Quarry (1.0 to 0.8 Mya)

Zane Stepka
, Ido Azuri
, Liora Kolska Horwitz
, Michael Chazan
, Filipe Natalio

Weizmann Institute of Science
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
University of Toronto

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

22 Scopus citations

Abstract

Pyrotechnology is a key element of hominin evolution. The identification of fire in early hominin sites relies primarily on an initial visual assessment of artifacts' physical alterations, resulting in potential underestimation of the prevalence of fire in the archaeological record. Here, we used a suite of spectroscopic techniques to counter the absence of visual signatures for fire and demonstrate the presence of burnt fauna and lithics at the Lower Paleolithic (LP) open-air site of Evron Quarry (Israel), dated between 1.0 and 0.8 Mya and roughly contemporaneous to Gesher Benot Ya'aqov where early pyrotechnology has been documented. We propose reexamining finds from other LP sites lacking visual clues of pyrotechnology to yield a renewed perspective on the origin, evolution, and spatiotemporal dispersal of the relationship between early hominin behavior and fire use.

Original language	English
Article number	2123439119
Journal	Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Volume	119
Issue number	25
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2123439119
State	Published - 21 Jun 2022
Externally published	Yes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 the Author(s).

Funding

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. We want to thank Prof. Mina Weinstein-Evron (Haifa University) for facilitating access to the Evron lithics collection and site archive; Dr. Iddo Pinkas, Dr. Anna-Eden Kossoy, and Dr. Yishay Feldman (Department of Chemical Research Support, Weizmann Institute of Science) for access to the Raman instrument and help in acquiring the XRD data, respectively. This work was financially supported by a research grant to F.N. from the Benoziyo Endowment Fund for the Advancement of Science, the estate of Raymond Lapon, the estate of Olga Klein Astrachan, the Braginsky Center for the Interface between Science and the Humanities, the Yeda-Sela Center for Basic Research, the Abram-son Family Center for Young Scientists, the estate of Harriet Nahum, the Dora Yoachimowicz Endowed Fund for Research, the Minzer Family Fund Scholarship, Gideon J. Hamburger, and the estate of Robert Einzig (Weizmann Institute of Science).

Funders
Abram-son Family Center for Young Scientists
Braginsky Center for the Interface between Science and the Humanities
Dora Yoachimowicz Endowed Fund for Research
Harriet Nahum
Yeda-Sela Center for Basic Research
Weizmann Institute of Science
Benoziyo Endowment Fund for the Advancement of Science

Keywords

Lower Paleolithic
pyrotechnology
spatiotemporal patterns
spectroscopy

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10.1073/pnas.2123439119

Cite this

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abstract = "Pyrotechnology is a key element of hominin evolution. The identification of fire in early hominin sites relies primarily on an initial visual assessment of artifacts' physical alterations, resulting in potential underestimation of the prevalence of fire in the archaeological record. Here, we used a suite of spectroscopic techniques to counter the absence of visual signatures for fire and demonstrate the presence of burnt fauna and lithics at the Lower Paleolithic (LP) open-air site of Evron Quarry (Israel), dated between 1.0 and 0.8 Mya and roughly contemporaneous to Gesher Benot Ya'aqov where early pyrotechnology has been documented. We propose reexamining finds from other LP sites lacking visual clues of pyrotechnology to yield a renewed perspective on the origin, evolution, and spatiotemporal dispersal of the relationship between early hominin behavior and fire use.",

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Hidden signatures of early fire at Evron Quarry (1.0 to 0.8 Mya)

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Funding

Keywords

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