CAPE TOWN, Jan. 8 (Xinhua) -- Some 60,000-year-old poison arrows have been discovered inside a rock shelter in South Africa, identified as the world's oldest known poison weapons.
The study, conducted by researchers from South Africa and Sweden, was published on Wednesday in the scientific journal named Science Advances.
The researchers chemically analyzed 10 arrowheads which had been unearthed decades ago at the Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter -- an archaeological site situated in KwaZulu-Natal Province. Five of the quartz arrow tips still contained traces of slow-acting poisons believed to have been extracted from a species of tumbleweed.
The discovery now pushes back the confirmed use of poison weapons by hunter-gatherers by over 50,000 years.
Previously, the oldest evidence of poison weapon use was found on 7,000-year-old "bone arrow points" from Kruger Cave in South Africa. Other older findings, such as the indirect evidence of a 24,000-year-old wooden "poison applicator" from Border Cave in South Africa, have been the subject of debate.
"Being able to identify the world's oldest arrow poison has been a complex undertaking and is incredibly encouraging for continued research," said Sven Isaksson, lead author and professor of laboratory archaeology at Stockholm University.
"This is the oldest direct evidence that humans used arrow poison. It shows that our ancestors in southern Africa not only invented the bow and arrow much earlier than previously thought, but also understood how to use nature's chemistry to increase hunting efficiency," said Marlize Lombard, co-author and researcher at the University of Johannesburg.
According to the study, when hit by the arrows, the slow-acting poison would weaken the targeted prey, dramatically reducing the time and energy required for persistence hunting.
This shows that these early hunters not only possessed technical skills but also had advanced planning abilities and an understanding of how poisons work over time -- characteristics that reflect modern human cognition, researchers said. ■