Four hundred thousand years ago, near a water hole on grasslands bordering a forest in what is now southern England, a group of Neandertals struck chunks of iron pyrite against flint to create sparks, ...

The controlled use of fire was a key part of the development of human technology with a range of uses that greatly expanded human cultural evolution. Although evidence at a number of archaeological ...

Neanderthals 400,000 years ago were striking flints to make fires, researchers have found. Neanderthals 400,000 years ago were striking flints to make fires, researchers have found. An artist’s ...

It's easy to take for granted that with the flick of a lighter or the turn of a furnace knob, modern humans can conjure flames — cooking food, lighting candles or warming homes. For much of our ...

At a site called East Farm in England, recent excavations revealed reddened silt, flint handaxes distorted by heat, and fragments of a mineral—iron pyrite—that could have been used to make sparks on ...

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Excavation of 400,000 year old pond sediments at Barnham, Suffolk. (CREDIT: Jordan Mansfield) A research team at the British ...

Niguss Baraki pointed out that the evidence suggests early technological skill, making sharp tools. Frances Forrest pointed to butchery marks on bones as evidence of increasingly expansive diets.

Set aside your matches or lighter and try to start a fire; chances are you’ll be left cold. But as early as 400,000 years ago ancient hominins might have had the skills to conjure flame, according to ...

A research team at the British Museum, led by Nick Ashton and Rob Davis, reports evidence that ancient humans could make and manage fire about 400,000 years ago. The findings, published in Nature, ...