TOOLS MAKYTH MAN—OAKLEY 443 
been found, also some fragments, including a lower jaw, referred to 
a related form called “Z'elanthropus,” which Robinson believes may 
have been the toolmaker. However, as the Swartkrans breccia is on 
a later time horizon than the Sterkfontein tools, one feels hesitant in 
attempting to explain the latter in terms of the former.” 
If in fact Australopithecus was the maker of the Sterkfontein tools, 
it would involve almost a revolution in our conception of “man.” 
We have already seen that there is some doubt about the existence 
of “Kafuan culture.” That is to say, there is no reliable evidence of 
tool making before the Late Villafranchian time level. Is it possible 
that systematic tool making arose, not gradually as most 19th-century 
evolutionists led us to imagine, but suddenly, and spread rapidly ? 
The Australopithecines must have originated as apes that became 
adapted to life in open country by walking upright. There are 
many reasons to suppose, as Dart, Bartholemew, and others have 
shown, that the earliest hominids must have been tool users. Bipedal- 
ism is initially disadvantageous biologically unless there is some com- 
pensating factor—in the case of the hominids this was the ability to 
use tools and wield weapons while moving. The early hominids sur- 
vived in open country by becoming scavengers and hunters, and this 
they were enabled to do by developing “extra-corporeal limbs” (as 
O. G. S. Crawford once called tools and weapons), which could be 
changed or discarded as circumstances dictated. The earliest tools 
and weapons would have been improvizations with whatever lay ready 
to hand. Although the hominids must have begun as occasional tool 
users, ultimately they were only able to survive in the face of rigor- 
ous natural selection by developing a system of communication among 
themselves which enabled cultural tradition to take the place of 
heredity. At this point systematic tool making replaced casual tool 
using, and it may be that this changeover took place in the Australo- 
pithecine stage. 
It would not be surprising, in view of the close correlation between 
culture and cerebral development, if there had been at this stage in- 
tense selection in favor of larger brains, with the result that the tran- 
sition from the small-brained Australopithecus to the larger-brained 
Pithecanthropus took place in a comparatively short space of time. 
The discoveries at Sterkfontein suggest that pebble tools may have 
been made by Australopithecus, while Professor Arambourg’s finds at 
Ternifine (“Atlanthropus”) indicate that by the time culture in Africa 
had reached the beginning of the Acheulian stage the toolmakers had 
attained the grade of Pithecanthropus. 
10In any case some authorities doubt whether “Telanthropus” is separable from Australo- 
pithecus (Le Gros Clark, 1958, p. 133.) 
