Hand axes found in Fordwich in Canterbury a century ago have now been dated, and they turn out to be the earliest of their kind ever found in the UK
A cache of prehistoric tools used by ancient humans living in what is now the UK has been confirmed to be at least 560,000 years old. The artefacts are the oldest of their kind known from the UK and among the earliest known in Europe.
Archaeologists first found ancient hand axes at the site in Fordwich, Canterbury, in the 1920s. But their age was unclear.at the University of Cambridge and his colleagues used a modern dating technique to determine the ages of several of the tools, which are now stored in the British Museum. They also conducted fresh excavations at the site and uncovered more evidence of ancient human activity.The hand axes may have been used to butcher animals and to process animal skins for making clothes.
The technique works by establishing when the sand grains were last exposed to daylight. “This provides a signal for how long [the tools] have been buried,” says Bridgland.The team estimates that the tools are about 560,000 to 620,000 years old. This makes the hand axes among the earliest found in Europe. But they are still relatively young compared to hand axes found in Africa, some of which are over a million years old, says Bridgland.at the Natural History Museum in the UK.
“We don’t know the human species responsible but the age of about 600,000 years is close to that of the Mauer sandpit in Germany, which produced the jawbone ofJournal reference: