Along the shores of Africa’s Lake Victoria in Kenya roughly 2.9 million years ago, early human ancestors used some of the oldest stone tools ever found to butcher hippos and pound plant material, according to new research led by scientists with the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and Queens College, CUNY, as well as the National Museums of Kenya, Liverpool John Moores University and the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.

根据史密森尼国家自然历史博物馆、纽约市立大学皇后学院、肯尼亚国家博物馆、利物浦约翰摩尔斯大学和克利夫兰自然历史博物馆的科学家们领导的一项新研究，大约290万年前，在肯尼亚的非洲维多利亚湖沿岸，早期的人类祖先使用了迄今为止发现的一些最古老的石器来屠宰河马和敲打植物材料。

The study, published today, Feb. 9, in the journal Science, presents what are likely to be the oldest examples of a hugely important stone-age innovation known to scientists as the Oldowan toolkit, as well as the oldest evidence of hominins consuming very large animals. Though multiple lines of evidence suggest the artifacts are likely to be about 2.9 million years old, the artifacts can be more conservatively dated to between 2.6 and 3 million years old, said lead study author Thomas Plummer of Queens College, research associate in the scientific team of the Smithsonian’s Human Origins Program.

这项研究发表在2月9日的《科学》杂志上，展示了可能是最古老的石器时代创新的例子，科学家们将其称为奥尔多安工具组(Oldowan toolkit)，以及人类食用大型动物的最古老证据。该研究的主要作者、史密森尼人类起源项目科学团队的助理研究员、皇后学院的托马斯·普卢默说，尽管多条证据表明这些文物可能有290万年的历史，但这些文物可以更保守地追溯到260万年到300万年之间。

Excavations at the site, named Nyayanga and located on the Homa Peninsula in western Kenya, also produced a pair of massive molars belonging to the human species’ close evolutionary relative Paranthropus. The teeth are the oldest fossilized Paranthropus remains yet found, and their presence at a site loaded with stone tools raises intriguing questions about which human ancestor made those tools, said Rick Potts, senior author of the study and the National Museum of Natural History’s Peter Buck Chair of Human Origins.

该遗址位于肯尼亚西部的霍马半岛，名为尼亚扬加(Nyayanga)。在该遗址的挖掘工作中，还发现了一对巨大的臼齿，属于人类进化上的近亲——副人类。该研究的资深作者、国家自然历史博物馆人类起源的彼得·巴克主席里克·波茨(Rick Potts)说，这些牙齿是迄今为止发现的最古老的类人猿化石，它们出现在一个堆满石器的地方，引发了一个有趣的问题，那就是人类的祖先是谁制造了这些工具。

“The assumption among researchers has long been that only the genus Homo, to which humans belong, was capable of making stone tools,” Potts said. “But finding Paranthropus alongside these stone tools opens up a fascinating whodunnit.”

波茨说:“长期以来，研究人员一直认为，只有人类所属的人属(Homo)才能够制造石器。”“但在这些石器旁边发现傍人兽开启了一个迷人的侦探小说故事。”

Whichever hominin lineage was responsible for the tools, they were found more than 800 miles from the previously known oldest examples of Oldowan stone tools — 2.6-million-year-old tools unearthed in Ledi-Geraru, Ethiopia. This greatly expands the area associated with Oldowan technology’s earliest origins. Further, the stone tools from the site in Ethiopia could not be tied to any particular function or use, leading to speculation about what the Oldowan toolkit’s earliest uses might have been.

无论这些工具是由哪一种人类血统制造的，它们都是在距离已知的最古老的奥尔多瓦石器样本800多英里的地方被发现的。奥尔多瓦石器是260万年前在埃塞俄比亚的莱迪杰拉鲁出土的。这极大地扩展了与奥尔多安石器技术最早起源相关的领域。此外，在埃塞俄比亚的遗址中发现的石器不能与任何特定的功能或用途联系在一起，这导致了人们对奥尔多瓦工具组最早用途的猜测。

Through analysis of the wear patterns on the stone tools and animal bones discovered at Nyayanga, Kenya, the team behind this latest discovery shows that these stone tools were used by early human ancestors to process a wide range of materials and foods, including plants, meat and even bone marrow.

通过分析在肯尼亚尼亚扬加发现的石器和动物骨骼的磨损模式，这一最新发现背后的团队表明，这些石器被早期人类祖先用来加工各种各样的材料和食物，包括植物、肉类，甚至骨髓。

The Oldowan toolkit includes three types of stone tools: hammerstones, cores and flakes. Hammerstones can be used for hitting other rocks to create tools or for pounding other materials. Cores typically have an angular or oval shape, and when struck at an angle with a hammerstone, the core splits off a piece, or flake, that can be used as a cutting or scraping edge or further refined using a hammerstone.

奥尔多安工具组包括三种类型的石器工具:锤石、岩心和薄片。锤石可以用来撞击其他岩石来制造工具，也可以用来撞击其他材料。岩心通常呈棱角状或椭圆形，当用锤击石以一定角度击打时，岩心会分裂出一块或片状物，可用作切割或刮擦边缘，或用锤击石进一步打磨。

“With these tools you can crush better than an elephant’s molar can and cut better than a lion’s canine can,” Potts said. “Oldowan technology was like suddenly evolving a brand-new set of teeth outside your body, and it opened up a new variety of foods on the African savannah to our ancestors.”

波茨说:“有了这些工具，你可以比大象的磨牙罐更擅长碾压，比狮子的犬齿罐更擅长切割。”“奥尔多安工具组技术就像突然在你的身体外进化出一套全新的牙齿，它为我们的祖先在非洲大草原上开辟了各种各样的食物。”

Potts and Plummer were first drawn to the Homa Peninsula in Kenya by reports of large numbers of fossilized baboon-like monkeys named Theropithecus oswaldi, which are often found alongside evidence of human ancestors. After many visits to the peninsula, a local man named Peter Onyango working with the team suggested they check out fossils and stone tools eroding from a nearby site that was ultimately named Nyayanga after an adjacent beach.

波茨和普卢默第一次来到肯尼亚的霍马半岛，是因为有报道称有大量名为奥氏狮尾狒的类似狒狒的猴子化石，它们经常与人类祖先的证据一起被发现。在对半岛进行了多次访问后，一位名叫彼得·奥尼扬戈(Peter Onyango)的当地人与该团队合作，建议他们检查一下附近一处遗址的化石和石器，该遗址最终以邻近的海滩命名为尼亚扬加(Nyayanga)。

Beginning in 2015, a series of excavations at Nyayanga returned a trove of 330 artifacts, 1,776 animal bones and the two hominin molars identified as belonging to Paranthropus. The artifacts, Plummer said, were clearly part of the stone-age technological breakthrough that was the Oldowan toolkit.

从2015年开始，在尼亚扬加进行的一系列挖掘工作带回了330件文物、1776块动物骨头和两颗被认定属于类人猿的古人类臼齿。普卢默说，这些文物显然是石器时代技术突破的一部分，也就是奥尔多安工具组。

Compared to the only other stone tools known to have preceded them — a set of 3.3-million-year-old artifacts unearthed at a site called Lomekwi 3, just west of Lake Turkana in Kenya — Oldowan tools were a significant upgrade in sophistication. Oldowan tools were systematically produced and often fashioned using what is known as “freehand percussion,” meaning the core was held in one hand and then struck with a hammerstone being wielded by the opposing hand at just the right angle to produce a flake — a technique that requires significant dexterity and skill.

与已知的其他唯一的石器相比——一组330万年前的文物出土于肯尼亚图尔卡纳湖以西的一个名为洛美克威3号地的地点——奥尔多瓦的工具在复杂程度上有了显著的提升。奥尔多瓦石器是有系统地生产出来的，通常是用所谓的“徒手敲击”来制作的，也就是说，一只手拿着石器的核心，然后用另一只手以合适的角度敲打锤石，以制造出薄片——这种技术需要相当的灵巧和技巧。

By contrast, most of the artifacts from Lomekwi 3 were created by using large stationary rocks as anvils, with the toolmaker either banging a core against the flat anvil stone to create flakes or by setting the core down on the anvil and striking it with a hammerstone. These more rudimentary modes of fabrication resulted in larger, cruder and more haphazard-looking tools.

相比之下，洛美克威3号地的大多数人工制品都是用大块的固定岩石作为石砧制成的，工具制造者要么用石芯敲打平的砧石，形成薄片，要么把石芯放在石砧上，用锤石敲击。这些更原始的制造模式导致了更大、更粗糙、更随意的工具。

Over time, the Oldowan toolkit spread all the way across Africa and even as far as modern-day Georgia and China, and it was not meaningfully replaced or amended until some 1.7 million years ago when the hand-axes of the Acheulean first appeared.

随着时间的推移，奥尔多安人的工具组传播到了整个非洲，甚至远至今天的格鲁吉亚和中国，直到大约170万年前阿舍利人的手斧首次出现，它才被有意义地取代或修改。

As part of their study, the researchers conducted microscopic analysis of wear patterns on the stone tools to determine how they were used, and they examined any bones seen to exhibit potential cut marks or other kinds of damage that might have come from stone tools.

作为研究的一部分，研究人员对石制工具的磨损模式进行了微观分析，以确定它们是如何使用的，他们还检查了任何可能显示出可能来自石器的切割痕迹或其他类型损伤的骨头。

The site featured at least three individual hippos. Two of these incomplete skeletons included bones that showed signs of butchery. The team found a deep cut mark on one hippo’s rib fragment and a series of four short, parallel cuts on the shin bone of another. Plummer said they also found antelope bones that showed evidence of hominins slicing away flesh with stone flakes or of having been crushed by hammerstones to extract marrow.

该遗址至少有三只独立的河马。其中两具不完整的骨骼中有被屠宰过的痕迹。研究小组在一只河马的肋骨碎片上发现了一个很深的切口，在另一只河马的胫骨上发现了一系列四个短而平行的切口。普卢默说，他们还发现了一些羚羊的骨头，这些骨头显示了古人类用石片切掉肉的证据，或者被锤石压碎以提取骨髓的证据。

The analysis of wear patterns on 30 of the stone tools found at the site showed that they had been used to cut, scrape and pound both animals and plants. Because fire would not be harnessed by hominins for another 2 million years or so, these stone toolmakers would have eaten everything raw, perhaps pounding the meat into something like a hippo tartare to make it easier to chew.

对现场发现的30件石器的磨损模式分析表明，它们曾被用来切割、刮擦和敲打动物和植物。因为人类在大约200万年后才会利用火，这些石器制造者可能会生吃所有东西，也许会把肉捣成类似河马鞑靼的东西，让它更容易咀嚼。

Using a combination of dating techniques, including the rate of decay of radioactive elements, reversals of Earth’s magnetic field and the presence of certain fossil animals whose timing in the fossil record is well established, the research team was able to date the items recovered from Nyayanga to between 2.58 and 3 million years old.

综合使用各种年代测定技术，包括放射性元素的衰变速度、地球磁场的逆转以及某些化石动物的存在，这些动物在化石记录中的时间已经得到了很好的确定，研究小组能够将从尼亚扬加发现的物品的年代确定在258万年到300万年之间。

“This is one of the oldest if not the oldest example of Oldowan technology,” Plummer said. “This shows the toolkit was more widely distributed at an earlier date than people realized, and that it was used to process a wide variety of plant and animal tissues. We don’t know for sure what the adaptive significance was but the variety of uses suggests it was important to these hominins.”

普卢默说:“这即使不是最古老的奥尔多安工具组技术，也是最古老的例子之一。”“这表明该工具包在更早的日期比人们意识到的更广泛地分布，并且它被用于处理各种植物和动物组织。”我们不确定它的适应性意义是什么，但用途的多样性表明它对这些古人类很重要。”

The discovery of teeth from the muscular-jawed Paranthropus alongside these stone tools begs the question of whether it might have been that lineage rather than the Homo genus that was the architect of the earliest Oldowan stone tools, or perhaps even that multiple lineages were making these tools at roughly the same time.

在这些石器旁边发现的颚部肌肉发达的傍人猿的牙齿引出了这样一个问题:是否可能是那个谱系而不是人属制造了最早的奥尔多安工具组石器，或者甚至可能是多个谱系大致同时制造了这些工具。

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