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Humans Crafted Complex Tools Earlier Than Thought

Once thought to have originated in Europe, a tool-making technique was in fact used by prehistoric Africans some 75,000 years ago.

Prehistoric people in southern Africa developed a highly skilled way of shaping stones into sharp-edged tools long before Europeans did, suggested a study released recently.

最近发布的一项研究报告表明，居住在非洲南部的史前人类发明了远胜过欧洲旧石器时代的高超削石方法，此方法可把石头刮削成锋利的器具。

A technique known as pressure-flaking, which scientists previously thought was invented in Europe some 20,000 years ago, involves using an animal bone or some other object to exert pressure near the edge of a stone piece and precisely carve out a small flake.

这种技术被称为压制刮削法。科学家们早期认为此方法是20,000年前欧洲人发明的，主要使用动物骨头或其他一些物质施压于石头边缘以精确的雕刻出小石片。

Researchers from the University of Colorado at Boulder examined stone tools dating from the Middle Stone Age, some 75,000 years ago, from Blombos Cave in what is now South Africa.

美国博尔德科罗拉多大学的研究人员仔细检查了这些来自南非布龙保斯山洞的石器，它们可追溯到中石器时代，有些甚至可追溯到75,000年前。

The team found that the tools had been made by pressure flaking, whereby a toolmaker would typically first strike a stone with hammer-like tools to give the piece its initial shape, and then refine the blade's edges and shape its tip.

该研究队发现这些石器是由压制刮削法制成的，石器制造者凭借此技术并用锤状的工具敲打石头直到石头的初步形态成型，然后再精炼叶片的边缘以及石器的顶端。

The technique provides a better means of controlling the sharpness, thickness and overall shape of two-sided tools like spearheads and stone knives.

此技术能够很好的控制石器的形状，薄度以及石器两面整体的形状，如矛尖、石刀。

\"Using the pressure flaking technique required strong hands and allowed toolmakers to exert a high degree of control on the final shape and thinness that cannot be achieved by percussion,\" Villa said. \"This control helped to produce narrower and sharper tool tips.\"

维拉说，“使用压制刮削技术时，石器制造者需具有粗壮有力的手，这样才能最大程度的控制好石器的最终形态以及薄度，简单的敲打是难以完成的。这种控制有助于铸造更窄、更锋利的刀具。”

To arrive at their conclusion that prehistoric Africans could have been the first to use pressure flaking to make tools, the researchers compared stone points, believed to be spearheads, made of silcrete -- quartz grains

cemented by silica -- from Blombos Cave, and compared them with points that they made themselves by heating and pressure-flaking silcrete collected at the same site.

为了得到史前非洲人可能是首先使用压制刮削技术制造石器的结论，研究人员比较了这些来自布龙保斯山洞的石尖，并认为它们是由硅质壳层（硅石结胶而成的石英颗粒）构成的矛尖。此外，研究人员还用自己制造的石尖（采用加热和刮削那些在同一地点收集的硅质壳层的方法）同这些石尖做比较。

The similarities between the ancient points and modern replicas led the scientists to conclude that many of the artifacts from Blombos Cave were made by pressure flaking, which scientists previously thought dated from the Upper Paleolithic Solutrean culture in France and Spain, roughly 20,000 years ago.

根据古代石尖与现代复制品之间的相似性，科学家们作出结论：许多源于布龙保斯山洞的史前古器物都是由压制刮削技术制作而成的。早前科学家们认为这项技术源于大约20,000年前，法国、西班牙旧石器时代前期的梭鲁特文化。

\"This finding is important because it shows that humans in South Africa had a sophisticated repertoire of tool-making techniques at a very early time,\" said Villa.

维拉说，“这项发现非常重要，因为它表明南非人在很早以前就拥有技术精湛的石器制造技术。”

The authors speculated that pressure flaking may have been invented in Africa and only later adopted in Europe, Australia and North America.

作者推测此压制刮削技术可能产生于非洲，后来才被欧洲、澳大利亚和北美采用。