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Scientists have found what may be the earliest evidence of clothing being made in a cave in Morocco, dating back 120,000 years.
It can be easy to take clothes and their origins for granted, as putting on an outfit at the start of the day is such a big part of what it means to be a human being in the modern world.
Someone who doesn’t take this for granted is anthropologist Emily Hallett of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany, who recently published an article describing the Moroccan discovery.
Hallett, along with a team of researchers, had investigated a number of bone fragments found in the Smugglers Cave, an important archaeological site on the Atlantic coast of Morocco.
Of the approximately 12,000 bone fragments found at the site, Hallett identified more than 60 animal bones that had been shaped by humans for use as tools. Patterns of cut marks on the bones matched tools found at other archaeological sites that had been used to process leather.
A bone tool from the cave. (Jacopo Niccolò Cerasoni, 2021)
“Organic materials such as leather and fur are extremely unlikely to survive in such ancient deposits, so as archaeologists we end up with evidence including tools and bones from animals that preserve skin marks, ”Hallett told ScienceAlert.
“We can put this evidence together and suggest that humans used bone tools to prepare leather and fur that were likely used for clothing.”
But it should be noted that the evidence is not entirely conclusive. “These bone tools could have been used to prepare leather for purposes other than clothing, such as storage devices,” Hallett added.
Yet clothing such as fur and leather would have been particularly beneficial for humans during this time. As the first humans spread out of Africa, they would have been confronted with new environments, and possibly extreme climatic habitats. Clothing and other tools would likely have contributed to the dispersal of humans to new environments around the world.
For fur, the humans in the Smugglers Cave skinned carnivores.
Carnivores were skinned and bone tools were used to prepare the furs. (Jacopo Niccolò Cerasoni, 2021)
“In this cave, there are three species of carnivores with skinning marks on their bones: Rüppell’s fox, golden jackal and wildcat,” Hallett told ScienceAlert.
“The cut marks on these carnivorous bones are limited to areas where incisions are made for fur removal, and there are no cut marks on the skeletal areas associated with the removal of the fur. meat.”
While for leather, several species of bovids have been found on the site.
“Hartebeest, aurochs and gazelle bones have been found in great abundance in the cave, and these animals have also been eaten by humans, as there are cut marks associated with the removal of meat from their bones.” Hallett added.
Hallett believes that given the specialization of these tools, they are likely part of a larger and older tradition. To add weight to this, genetic studies of clothing lice by others suggest a clothing origin of at least 170,000 years in Africa.
“These tools were most likely used for clothing, and it’s interesting that archaeological records and DNA evidence both point to an ancient origin in Africa,” Hallett said.
There may still be unknown sites in Africa waiting to be discovered with tools and evidence that could further shed light on the history of human clothing making.
The study was published in the journal iScience.
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