Charcoal Analysis Suggests Any Wood Would Do for Early Hominins

Analysis of charcoal found at the site of Gesher Benot Ya'aqov in northern Israel shows that early hominins used readily available tree species for firewood, according to a statement released by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. For tens of thousands of years, hunter-gatherers repeatedly returned to Gesher Benot Ya'aqov, which was situated near a lake. Ethel Allué of the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution, Naama Goren-Inbar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and an international team of scientists examined more than 250 pieces of charcoal from an occupation layer at the site dated to some 780,000 years...