This Means War!

Posted on Categories Discover Magazine

Sites of ancient conflicts reignite a debate over when members of our species first took up arms against each other.

The skull, though weathered from millennia of brutal heat and scouring sands, is unmistakably human. Unmistakable, too, are the signs of a violent death: massive fractures from the blunt force of a weapon wielded by another human. The shattered cranium is one of several from a site in Kenya known as Nataruk, where, long ago, a band of hunter-gatherers met its end. Described in Nature in 2016, the remains are believed to be among the earliest evidence of human warfare. Although the terrain is ari…

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