Comprehensive coverage

A stone tool for cutting and processing hides of camels from 400,000 years ago

A new study by Tel Aviv University reveals: in the areas of the Samaria Mountains, east of Jaljulia and Merat Kesem, special stone tools appeared for the first time in the world, which were used about 400 thousand years ago for hunting donkeys

Percy's donkey. From Wikipedia
Percy's donkey. From Wikipedia

A new study by Tel Aviv University reveals: in the areas of the Samaria Mountains, east of Jaljulia and Merat Kesem, special stone tools appeared for the first time in the world, which were used about 400 thousand years ago for hunting donkeys. These stone tools, called Kina-type scrapers (after a site in France where they were first identified) were characterized by an active edge designed in the form of scales that allows for both cutting operations and leather processing. 

The research was conducted under the leadership of Vlad Litov and Prof. Ran Barkai MThe Department of Archeology and Ancient Near Eastern Civilizations, and published in the journal Archaeologies.

Mount Gerizim and Mount Ibal. Photo: Dr. Shai Bar
Mount Gerizim and Mount Ibal. Photo: Dr. Shai Bar

According to the researchers, during ancient history the ancient humans mainly concentrated on hunting elephants, which provided the most calories in the daily human diet, and for this they used stone tools called "scrubbers" to process the skins and scrub the meat off the bones. However, at the end of the Lower Paleolithic period, about 400 thousand years ago, and since most of the elephants had long been extinct in the Land of Israel, the hunters of the land moved to focus on light-footed donkeys. For this, the ancient hunters had to make the technological adaptations that would allow them to hunt, butcher and process the donkeys, which are agile and small in a significant way compared to the elephants. 

Necessity is the father of invention: the technological development resulted from the change in the nature of the animals in the area

An example of a Kina type scrubber. Photo: Dr. Ran Barkai, Tel Aviv University
An example of a Kina type scrubber. Photo: Prof. Ran Barkai, Tel Aviv University

Litov explains: "As part of the research, we sought to understand why stone tools change throughout human prehistory and we focused on the technological change that took place in the scrubber during the Lower Paleolithic period, about 400 thousand years ago. We discovered that during this period there was a dramatic change in the human diet, probably due to the composition of the fauna: the large animals, especially the elephants, disappeared - and man was forced to hunt smaller animals, mainly donkeys. Of course, hunting a large and cumbersome elephant is one thing, and hunting a nimble donkey is a completely different story. Even butchering an animal like a donkey is a more complex and delicate operation. That's why we see the appearance of the new kina scrapers, characterized by a more designed, sharp, and uniform active edge compared to the simple scrapers that humans from the illusory culture used for about a million years to dismember elephants and other large animals." 

Those unique stone tools were made from stone that originated in the mountains of Samaria, east of Jaljulia and Merat Kesem, which were also the calving areas of the donkeys. The archaeologists from Tel Aviv University excavated at the Jaljulia archaeological site, near Route 6, where humans of the Homo erectus type probably lived - and also relied on findings from the nearby archaeological site of Kesem Cave. At both sites, many scrubbers of the modern type were found, made from flint that does not exist in the vicinity of the sites - and its closest sources are in the Ben Shemen forest area to the south and the western slopes of Samaria to the east. For this reason, the researchers estimate that Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim were sacred to the ancient hunters starting from the Paleolithic period.

An example of a Kina type scrubber. Photo: Dr. Ran Barkai, Tel Aviv University
An example of a Kina type scrubber. Photo: Dr. Ran Barkai, Tel Aviv University

Prof. Barkai adds: "In the research we identify connections between technological developments and changes in the animals that the ancient humans hunted and ate. Over the years, scientific research believed that the changes in stone tools resulted from biological and mental developments of humans. We show that the connection is a double connection, both practical and conceptual: on the one hand, humans moved to produce more sophisticated tools because they had to hunt and butcher small, agile and leaner animals. On the other hand, we also recognize a perceptual connection: the calving areas of the yaks are the Ebal and Gerizim mountains in Samaria, and the scrubbers from Jaljulia and Merat Kesem that were used to dissect yaks were made from flint in the Samaria mountains - a considerable distance of about 20 km from to Julia In other words, we found a connection between the source of the donkeys and the source of the flint that dismembered their flesh, and we believe that this connection was of perceptual importance for these hunters. They knew where the donkeys came from, and it was important to them to make the tools with which they cut the donkeys out of this flint. This is a phenomenon known all over the world, and it is still widespread among indigenous groups." 

Prof. Ran Barkai. Photo: Tel Aviv University.
Prof. Ran Barkai. Photo: Tel Aviv University.

Litov concludes: "We hypothesize that the mountains of Samaria were in the eyes of those people holy, since they are where the donkeys came from. It is important to note that in Jaljulia we find many other tools from other stones of a different origin. When the local people saw that the elephants were disappearing and walking, they became dependent on donkeys. They identified the source of the abundance of donkeys and there began to develop the unique scrubbers. This is the beginning of a phenomenon that later spreads all over the world. These scrubbers first appear in Jaljulia, between 500 and 300 thousand years before our time, still on a small scale - and shortly after, 400 to 200 thousand years before our time, on a much larger scale in Kesem Cave. Also in the altar on Mount Ebal attributed to Yehoshua ben Nun, where the 'covenant between the two beasts' may have been made, many dismembered donkey bones were found. So it seems that the Ichamors and the mountains of Samaria were also sacred for the Israelites hundreds of thousands of years after the events described here."

More of the topic in Hayadan: