This Is the Oldest Evidence of Humans Making Fire

Archaeologists in England say a few tiny mineral flecks may rewrite a big chapter in human prehistory. At a site called Barnham in Suffolk, researchers uncovered what they describe as the oldest direct evidence of fire-making: traces of iron pyrite, or fool's gold, which sparks when struck against flint, alongside heat-damaged stone tools and reddened clay subject to repeated intense heat, per Live Science. The evidence dates to more than 400,000 years ago and suggests early Neanderthals were deliberately creating and controlling fires 350,000 years earlier than previously documented, according to a study published Wednesday in Nature.

The discovery of pyrite—rare in the local geology—was the "turning point," says study co-author Nick Ashton of the British Museum, who argues it must have been brought in specifically to start fires. No human or animal bones have survived at the site, leaving no direct evidence of cooking. But Chris Stringer of London's Natural History Museum says the likely fire-makers were early Neanderthals, based on similarly dated Neanderthal remains at the nearby site of Swanscombe. This bolsters the view that Neanderthals were cognitively sophisticated, with large brains and complex behavior comparable to our own.

The work also deepens long-running debates about when controlled fire became a regular part of human life and whether different human groups learned to make fire independently. While other sites in Africa and the Middle East show signs of burning dating as far back as 1.5 million years, those cases are less conclusive. "To date there is no clear evidence for control of fire any earlier than Barnham," says Stringer. If Neanderthals in Europe were systematically making fire 400,000 years ago, the researchers say, it may have helped them expand into colder regions like Britain. The use of fire would also "allow the evolution of a bigger brain," Stringer says, per NBC News.