Fig. 7. Oldowan tools, representative of the earliest stone implements yet known, 
dating back as far as about 2.5 myr. These tools consisted of sharp flakes (center and 
right) struck from small cobbles (left), which might themselves also have been used 
as tools. Scale is 5 cm. 
too much from his or her own parents or offspring. Innovations arise 
within species, for there’s no place else for them to do so. 
Still, whatever the first toolmaker looked like, the tools them- 
selves mark a major cognitive leap forward among hominids. They 
allowed the exploitation of a new source of protein—animal car- 
casses—that had previously been largely off-limits to tiny defense- 
less foragers who would have had to yield to most competitors for 
such resources. These early stone tools (fig. 7) were crude—simple 
sharp flakes knocked off larger stone ‘‘cores’’—but highly effective: 
experimental archaeologists have butchered entire elephants using 
them. What’s more, it takes considerable insight, well beyond what 
any ape has achieved, even with intensive coaching (Toth et al., 
1993), to strike a cobble with another at precisely the angle neces- 
sary to detach a sharp flake. Further yet, we know that the earliest 
Homo anticipated needing the tools they would make, for we have 
evidence that they carried suitable stones around with them for long 
distances before making them into tools as needed (see review by 
Schick and Toth, 1993). With the invention of stone tools, we have 
the first unequivocal evidence that hominids had moved cognitively 
well beyond the ape league, whatever they looked like. 
At about 1.8 myr ago we find the first fossils of the earliest mem- 
ber of genus Homo to have had a body size and build essentially 
comparable to our own, which makes one wonder whether it should 
not be with such creatures that we should really begin to recognize 
13 
