Scientists Discover 430,000-Year-Old Wooden Tools—Oldest Ever Found

Researchers have uncovered the oldest known hand-held wooden tools ever discovered, offering new insight into the skills and behavior of early humans nearly half a million years ago. An international team led by scientists from the University of Reading, the University of Tübingen, and the Senckenberg Nature Research Society identified the ancient artifacts at the Marathousa 1 archaeological site in central Greece's Peloponnese region. The findings date back around 430,000 years and were described in the journal PNAS.

The study describes two carefully worked wooden objects that were shaped and used by humans. One was made from alder wood, while the other came from either willow or poplar. Researchers say the discovery pushes back evidence for this type of wooden tool use by at least 40,000 years. The site also contained stone tools along with the remains of elephants and other animals, suggesting the area was once used for butchering prey near the edge of an ancient lake during the Middle Pleistocene, a period spanning roughly 774,000 to 129,000 years ago.

"The Middle Pleistocene was a critical phase in human evolution, during which more complex behaviors developed," says Professor Katerina Harvati, a paleoanthropologist and expert in human evolution who leads the long-term research program at Marathousa 1. "The earliest reliable evidence of the targeted technological use of plants also dates from this period." Previous discoveries at the site, including stone and bone artifacts, had already shown that the people living there carried out a wide range of activities with considerable skill, prompting the research team to closely examine pieces of preserved wood recovered during excavations.

"Unlike stones, wooden objects need special conditions to survive over long periods of time," says Dr. Annemieke Milks, a leading expert in early wooden tools. "We examined all the wooden remains closely, looking at their surfaces under microscopes. We found marks from chopping and carving on two objects -- clear signs that early humans had shaped them." One of the wooden artifacts was a small section of an alder branch or trunk that displayed clear shaping marks as well as signs of wear from use. Researchers believe it may have been used for digging in soft ground near the lakeshore or possibly for stripping bark from trees.

The discovery challenges previous assumptions about the technological capabilities of early humans and demonstrates sophisticated tool use much earlier than previously documented. Not every marked piece of wood at the site was shaped by people—researchers also studied a larger alder fragment with grooves carved into its surface that were determined to be left by a large carnivore, possibly a bear. The careful analysis required to distinguish human tool marks from animal damage highlights the rigorous methodology needed to verify such ancient discoveries and their significance for understanding human evolution.