A double-pointed wooden throwing stick from Schöningen, Germany: Results and new insights from a multianalytical study

Abstract

The site of Schöningen (Germany), dated to ca. 300,000 years ago, yielded the earliest large-scale record of humanly-made wooden tools. These include wooden spears and shorter double-pointed sticks, discovered in association with herbivores that were hunted and butchered along a lakeshore. Wooden tools have not been systematically analysed to the same standard as other Palaeolithic technologies, such as lithic or bone tools. Our multianalytical study includes micro-CT scanning, 3-dimensional microscopy, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, supporting a systematic technological and taphonomic analysis, thus setting a new standard for wooden tool analysis. In illustrating the biography of one of Schöningen’s double-pointed sticks, we demonstrate new human behaviours for this time period, including sophisticated woodworking techniques. The hominins selected a spruce branch which they then debarked and shaped into an aerodynamic and ergonomic tool. They likely seasoned the wood to avoid cracking and warping. After a long period of use, it was probably lost while hunting, and was then rapidly buried in mud. Taphonomic alterations include damage from trampling, fungal attack, root damage and compression. Through our detailed analysis we show that Middle Pleistocene humans had a rich awareness of raw material properties, and possessed sophisticated woodworking skills. Alongside new detailed morphometrics of the object, an ethnographic review supports a primary function as a throwing stick for hunting, indicating potential hunting strategies and social contexts including for communal hunts involving children. The Schöningen throwing sticks may have been used to strategically disadvantage larger ungulates, potentially from distances of up to 30 metres. They also demonstrate that the hominins were technologically capable of capturing smaller fast prey and avian fauna, a behaviour evidenced at contemporaneous Middle Pleistocene archaeological sites.

The archaeological visibility of chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) nut-cracking

“…Wooden tool use is documented in the middle and upper Palaeolithic archaeological records and in modern ethnographic literature (Oswalt, 1976;Goren-Inbar, 1991;Aranguren et al, 2018;Barham et al, 2023;Caruso Fermé et al, 2023;Hrnčíř, 2023;Milks et al, 2023a;Riede et al, 2023;Leder et al, 2024). However, evidence for its use as a tool material is largely lacking before 400ka, where several wooden artifacts interpreted as spears, digging tools, and leather working implements have been identified (Thieme, 1997;Bridgland et al, 1999;Richter and Krbetschek, 2015;Barham et al, 2023;Milks et al, 2023b;Leder et al, 2024). Recent identification of a wooden artifact associated with structural use dated to 476ka (Barham et al, 2023) along with a potentially earlier example of a polished wooden plank (Goren-Inbar, 1991) suggests an earlier use of wood.…”

The Evolution of Paleolithic Hunting Weapons: A Response to Declining Prey Size

“…A wooden spear from Clacton, dated to MIS 11 (427 thousand years ago (ka) [38], and a wooden spear and hunting sticks from Schoningen, dated to MIS 9 (330 ka) [39][40][41][42], are the earliest archaeological evidence for hunting weapons. Schoningen spears' diameter suggests thrusting spears [43].…”