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Earliest presence of humans in northeast Asia

Nature volume 413, pages 413–417 (2001)Cite this article

Abstract

The timing of the earliest habitation and oldest stone technologies in different regions of the world remains a contentious topic in the study of human evolution1,2,3,4. Here we contribute to this debate with detailed magnetostratigraphic results on two exposed parallel sections of lacustrine sediments at Xiaochangliang in the Nihewan Basin, north China; these results place stringent controls on the age of Palaeolithic stone artifacts that were originally reported over two decades ago5. Our palaeomagnetic findings indicate that the artifact layer resides in a reverse polarity magnetozone bounded by the Olduvai and Jaramillo subchrons. Coupled with an estimated rate of sedimentation, these findings constrain the layer's age to roughly 1.36 million years ago. This result represents the age of the oldest known stone assemblage comprising recognizable types of Palaeolithic tool in east Asia, and the earliest definite occupation in this region as far north as 40° N.

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Figure 1: Location of the Xiaochangliang Palaeolithic site in the Nihewan Basin.
Figure 2: Examples of flaked stone artifacts excavated from Xiaochangliang.
Figure 3: Lithologic and magnetic susceptibility stratigraphy of Donggou (a) and Xiaochangliang (b) sections.
Figure 4: Determined magnetostratigraphy at Donggou (DG) and Xiaochangliang (XCL) and correlation with the geomagnetic polarity timescale21.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China

    R. X. Zhu, C. L. Deng, Y. X. Pan, B. Guo, C. D. Shi, Z. T. Guo & B. Y. Yuan

  2. Physics Department, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, 93410, California, USA

    K. A. Hoffman

  3. Human Origins Program, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 20560, DC, USA

    R. Potts

  4. Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Palaeoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100044, China

    Y. M. Hou & W. W. Huang

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Correspondence to R. X. Zhu or K. A. Hoffman.

Supplementary information

Figure 1

(GIF 26.3 KB)

Orthogonal projections of representative progressive alternating field (mT) or thermal (°C) demagnetization. The solid (open) symbols refer to the horizontal (vertical) plane. As seen in these plots the secondary magnetization was mainly a north component suggesting a viscous overprinting in the recent Brunhes normal polarity period. The primary component was well defined either with thermal or AF demagnetization.

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Zhu, R., Hoffman, K., Potts, R. et al. Earliest presence of humans in northeast Asia. Nature 413, 413–417 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35096551

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