Study finds humans were making fire 400,000 years ago, far earlier than once thought
LONDON — British scientists say ancient humans may have learned to make fire much earlier than previously thought, after discovering evidence that deliberate fires took place in what is now eastern England around 400,000 years ago.
The results, described in the journal Nature, push back the oldest known date for controlled fire ignition by around 350,000 years. Until now, the oldest confirmed evidence came from Neanderthal sites in what is now northern France, dating to around 50,000 years ago.
The discovery was made at Barnham, a Paleolithic site in Suffolk that has been excavated for decades. A team led by the British Museum identified a piece of fired clay, flint axes fractured by intense heat and two fragments of iron pyrite, a mineral that produces sparks when struck against flint.
The researchers spent four years analyzing to rule out natural wildfires. Geochemical tests showed temperatures exceeded 700 degrees Celsius (1,292 Fahrenheit), with evidence of repeated burning in the same location.
This pattern, they say, corresponds to a home built rather than love at first sight.
Rob Davis, a Paleolithic archaeologist at the British Museum, said the combination of high temperatures, controlled combustion and pyrite fragments shows “how they actually made fire and the fact that they did it”.
Iron pyrite does not occur naturally in Barnham. Its presence suggests that the people who lived there deliberately collected it because they knew its properties and could use it to ignite tinder.
Deliberate fires are rarely preserved in the archaeological record. Ashes disperse easily, charcoal decomposes, and heat-altered sediments can be eroded.
At Barnham, however, the burned deposits were sealed into ancient pond sediments, allowing scientists to reconstruct how early humans used the site.
The researchers say the implications for human evolution are substantial.
Fire allowed early populations to survive in colder environments, deter predators, and cook food. Cooking breaks down toxins in roots and tubers and kills pathogens in meat, improving digestion and freeing up more energy to support a larger brain.
Chris Stringer, a specialist in human evolution at the Natural History Museum, said fossils from Britain and Spain suggest the Barnham people were early Neanderthals whose cranial features and DNA indicate increasing cognitive and technological sophistication.
Fire also enabled new forms of social life. Evening gatherings around a hearth would have provided time for planning, storytelling, and strengthening group relationships, behaviors often associated with the development of language and more organized societies.
Archaeologists say the Barnham site fits a wider pattern in Britain and mainland Europe between 500,000 and 400,000 years ago, when the brain size of early humans began to approach modern levels and when evidence of increasingly complex behavior became more visible.
Nick Ashton, curator of the Paleolithic collections at the British Museum, described it as “the most exciting discovery of my 40-year career”.
For archaeologists, this discovery helps answer a long-standing question: When humans stopped relying on lightning and wildfires and instead learned to create flames wherever and whenever they needed them.
