Butchered bird bones put humans in Madagascar 10,500 years ago
Cut marks on the remains of an ancient elephant bird pushes the timeline back 6,000 years
By Bruce Bower
Humans made their mark on Madagascar around 6,000 years earlier than previously thought, scientists say. Those early migrants hunted massive, flightless birds once native to the island off southeast Africa, leaving butchery marks on the bird bones that enabled the new timeline.
Cuts and fractures on three previously unearthed leg and foot bones from one of Madagascar’s extinct elephant birds resulted from the animal being killed and cut up with stone tools at least 10,500 years ago, say vertebrate paleontologist James Hansford of the Zoological Society of London and colleagues. Until now, the oldest evidence of humans on Madagascar consisted of stone tools dating to roughly 4,000 years ago.