Archaeology: Early humans were in England 700,000 years ago

Early humans were living in Britain as much as 700,000 years ago, according to a newly discovered set of flint tools that provides evidence that early human species journeyed across the Alps and into northern Europe much earlier than experts had suspected

WWW.NATURE.COM/NATURE
This press release is copyright Nature.

The Nature journals press site is at <http://press.nature.com>
PLEASE CITE NATURE AND OUR WEBSITE www.nature.com/nature AS THE SOURCE OF
THE FOLLOWING ITEMS. IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO
http://www.nature.com/nature

Archaeology: Early humans were in England 700,000 years ago (pp1008-1012;
N&V)

Early humans were living in Britain as much as 700,000 years ago, according
to a newly discovered set of flint tools that provides evidence that early
human species journeyed across the Alps and into northern Europe much
earlier than experts had suspected.

Humans are known to have been present in southern Europe some 780,000 years
ago, but it was not known how long they waited before venturing into the
colder north of the continent, explain Anthony Stuart and colleagues in this
week's Nature. The team unearthed the stone tools near Lowestoft in the
southeast of England.

New accurate dating methods show that the tools are some 200,000 years more
ancient than the next oldest confirmed human artefacts from northern Europe,
Stuart and his colleagues say. A related News & Views article by Wil
Roebroeks accompanies this research.

CONTACT:
Anthony J. Stuart (University College London, London, UK)
Tel: +44 1263 761570; E-mail: [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>

Wil Roebroeks (Leiden University, Leiden, The Netherlands)
Tel: + 31 71 527 2387; E-mail: [email protected]

PRESS CONTACTS...

For North America and Canada
Katie McGoldrick, Nature Washington
Tel: +1 202 737 2355; E-mail: [email protected]

For Japan, Korea, China, Singapore and Taiwan
Rinoko Asami, Nature Tokyo
Tel: +81 3 3267 8751; E-mail: [email protected]

For the UK/Europe/other countries not listed above
Katharine Mansell, Nature London
Tel: +44 20 7843 4658; E-mail [email protected]

Sophie Hebden, Nature London
Tel: +44 20 7843 4502, E-mail: [email protected]

Nature Publishing Group (NPG) is a division of Macmillan Publishers Ltd,
dedicated to serving the academic and professional scientific community.
NPG's flagship title, Nature, is the world's most highly-cited weekly
multidisciplinary journal and was first published in 1869. Other
publications include Nature research journals, Nature Reviews, Nature
Clinical Practice, and a range of prestigious academic journals, including
society-owned publications.

NPG is a global company, with headquarters in London and offices in New
York, San Francisco, Washington DC, Boston, Tokyo, Paris, Munich and
Basingstoke. For more information, please go to www.nature.com

Published: 14 Dec 2005

Contact details:

The Macmillan Building, 4 Crinan Street
London
N1 9XW
United Kingdom

+44 20 7833 4000
Country: 
News topics: 
Content type: 
Websites: 
Reference: 

Nature