this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2024
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Stick Enthusiasts

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cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/HistoryArtifacts/t/834466

Oldest wooden spear known to exist | Schöningen, Germany (400,000 BCE)

More information: https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/behavior/getting-food/oldest-wooden-spear

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 8 months ago (2 children)

That's a great sick! Very nice and pointy.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

My dog would 100% pick that stick up.

Very nice stick.

[–] M137 3 points 8 months ago
[–] [email protected] 23 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I saw this on my front page and was like "thats just a stick lmao"

and then I saw the community name. Perfection

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

I had the exact opposite reaction. I saw this in my front page and thought "cool what community is this"... if real then that's way cooler than just a stick.

[–] TheGiantKorean 17 points 8 months ago

The OG stick!

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

This wooden spear is 400,00 years old

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clacton_Spear

The Schöningen spears have been updated to 300,000 years old

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sch%C3%B6ningen_spears

[–] PoopingCough 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Actually if you read the part where they date these spears they give a range that includes as far back as 400,000. So it might be older or might not be.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Re-read it again.

The age of the spears, originally assessed as being between 380,000 and 400,000 years old was estimated from their stratigraphic position

However, more recently, thermoluminescence dating […] date the spears to between 337,000 and 300,000 years old, placing them at the end of the interglacial Marine Isotope Stage 9.

All studies place the spears in the Holstein interglacial, which is commonly correlated to either of the mentioned marine isotope stages, MIS 11 (424–374 thousand years ago) and MIS 9 (337–300 thousand years ago).

I’ve edited it for clairty. Let me summarise this.

  1. Originally assumed to be 400,000 years old due to location.

  2. Later testing shows 300,000 years.

  3. All studies so far say that they are either of these two ranges.

Point 3 is a nothing statement because scientists disagree and thus we have leave it open-ended, even though actual testing of the site points to 300,000 years.


tl;dr: We assumed it was 400,000. We tested and it was actually 300,000. We cant confirm 100%, so we will say it could be either.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

so, we have at least 2 common interests : aigen and sticks 🤣

the earliest and the latest tools :)

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Haha hopefully not the last tool we make.

I was walking in a forest today and there was so many sticks i wanted to pick up! I had to leave them because animals need them more than I do.

Someone even stacked them so I took a photo
https://imgur.com/dRRftWK

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

i made a rather reliable stick from a broken holly branch I've found years ago. When i enter the forest with a "walking stick" already in hand, i no longer feel that need to pick up sticks

somehow hacked that strange desire to pick up sticks 🤷

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

Excellent content, would upstick again. 10/10

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Now I'm no expert in ancient weaponry, but that looks more like a sharpened stick than a spear to me.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)
[–] niktemadur 3 points 8 months ago

non-stick shaming

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I agree, I think spears are supposed to have a hardened end. I know I've seen other examples of early spears without an end attachments, but they usually had an end that has been hardened by carbonizing the point over a fire.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

The one end looks discolored so might've been fire-hardened