Archaeologica.org

Stone tools that are half a million years old have been unearthed in Israel — and they still have traces of elephant fat clinging to them.

The new discovery shows that ancient humans used tools to process and butcher large animals, researchers say.

Though anthropologists had strongly suspected that early humans used tools to break down a carcass for its muscle, fat and marrow, "there was no smoking gun to show that the stone tools were, indeed, used for these kinds of tasks," said study co-author Ran Barkai, a professor of archaeology at Tel Aviv University in Israel. [In Photos: Tracing the Invention of Ancient Stone Toolmaking]

"there was no smoking gun to show that the stone tools were, indeed, used for these kinds of tasks," said study co-author Ran Barkai, a professor of archaeology at Tel Aviv University in Israel.