Ancient Containers May Have Been Early Humans' First Tools, Not Weapons

Contrary to popular belief, early humans' first tools may not have been weapons like sharp stones or blunt sticks, but rather containers. Anthropologist Mark Kisiel and his team have compiled a database of hundreds of prehistoric containers, some dating back four to five hundred thousand years. These findings challenge the long-held assumption that containers only emerged with the advent of agriculture about 10,000 years ago for storing surplus crops. Kisiel defines a container broadly as any object that can hold something, separate it from the outside world, and be transported. Examples include prehistoric lamps made of sandstone, needle cases from swan wings, and large ostrich eggs used for carrying water in Africa. The oldest artifact in their database is a dish made of tree bark found in Kalambo Falls, Zambia, estimated to be 400,000 to 500,000 years old. While most discovered containers are from Europe, this is likely due to more extensive archaeological excavations there, suggesting containers were used much earlier and more widely, with perishable materials like wood and leaves not surviving over millennia. Researchers propose that one of the earliest uses for containers might have been to carry infants, a significant challenge for early humans like Australopithecus who lacked the dense fur of primates to hold their young. This idea echoes earlier theories from 1976 by anthropologists Nancy Tanner and Adrienne Zillman, who suggested that baskets used by women for gathering food could have been early tools. The survival of early humans may have depended more on their ability to collect and store food in containers, and their capacity for cooperation and empathy, than on aggression or intelligence, as evidenced by the potential sharing of stored food.