SCIENCE & TECH: Elephant Fossils Show Evidence of Ancient Animal Butchery in India

A new study by an international team of scientists has found evidence that ancient elephant fossils recovered in the Kashmir Valley of South Asia were butchered by archaic human ancestors. This would have happened between 300,000 and 400,000 years ago, during the Middle Pleistocene epoch. As of now this is the oldest example of animal butchery ever found in India, predating the previous oldest example (from 8,000 BC) by a significant amount.

The elephant fossils were unearthed in 2000 near the town of Pampore, Kashmir. It is believed there are at least three elephants represented in the fossil collection, all of which had died near the Jhelum River and were eventually buried deeply in sediment, which kept them well-preserved as they fossilized. Most of the bones found belonged to one large male specimen, and that included the one elephant skull that was recovered.

Just a short distance away from the fossils many ancient stone tools were also excavated. At the time of this discovery, however, it wasn’t clear if this was related in any way to the presence of the animals, or if it was just a coincidence.

Tracking Down the Mysterious Meat Eaters of Pleistocene India

In 2019, a team of researchers from India and the United Kingdom worked together on a fresh study of the fossils, and were eventually able to identify them as belonging to a long-extinct species of giant elephant known as the Palaeoloxodon. This huge animal was twice as large as the modern African elephant, yet it lived so long ago that fossil finds of it have been rare. In fact, only one other Palaeoloxodon skeleton has ever been found, which is why it took so long to discover the true identity of the Pampore creatures.

The researchers explained how they identified this elephant in a recent article published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. But it was a second article they published, in Quaternary Science Reviews, that revealed their most eye-opening discovery, which is that the fossilized elephant bones showed clear signs of having been butchered by human hands—or in this case, by the hands of ancient hominin ancestors of humans.

In the latter article, the researchers described their identification of elephant bone flakes, which would have been created when archaic humans cracked open the bones of the animal to extract the marrow, an energy-dense fatty tissue with high nutritional value. In total the study authors identified 87 stone tools of the elephant excavation near Pampore, and they now believe that these tools would have been used to extract the bone marrow from the dead elephants, and presumably to remove the meat from the bones as well.

Skull of largest Palaeoloxodon specimen, kept in glass case since its discovery in 2000. (Advait Jukar/Florida Museum of Natural History)

This is by far the earliest evidence of animal butchery ever found in India, which is what makes this such a significant discovery from an anthropological perspective.

“So, the question is, who are these hominins?” said study lead author Advait Jukar, a curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Florida Museum of Natural History, in a press release from that institution. “What are they doing on the landscape and are they going after big game or not? Now we know for sure, at least in the Kashmir Valley, these hominins are eating elephants.”

Up to now, ancient hominin fossils found in India have all been linked to just one individual from one species, known as the Narmada human. The first of these fossils was found near the Narmada River in central India in 1982, with more bones having been recovered at the same site in later excavations.

Notably, the tools from the Pampore site were made from basalt, a rock that is not found in the local area. The researchers think the raw materials were carried to the site from elsewhere, and then chipped to create the tools that have been found. The researchers have dated the site to between 300,000 and 400,000 years ago based on the way the tools were shaped, since other evidence has linked this style of work to the Middle Pleistocene.

This is an extraordinary discovery, given that the previous oldest evidence of butchery of animals in India only dated back about 10,000 years.

“It might just that people haven’t looked closely enough or are sampling in the wrong place,” Jukar offered. “But up until now, there hasn’t been any direct evidence of humans feeding on large animals in India.”

Is There More Evidence of Ancient Butchery Out There?

While there is evidence of butchery in the fossils, there is nothing to suggest that the Narmada humans hunted the Palaeoloxodon. There is no signs of spear point marks on the fossilized bones, suggesting the humans who butchered the animal acted as scavengers, opportunistically harvesting the remains of animals that had died of natural causes.

Paleontologist Advait Jukar cleans giant elephant head found in Kashmir Valley in 2000. (Advait Jukar/Florida Museum of Natural History)

There was more than one elephant at the same location, which does leave an open question as to how they all ended up dying in the same place. Perhaps they all died from a disease they shared, had all gotten stuck in the mud near the river together and had not been able to escape, or had in fact been killed as a group by hunters, despite the lack of any clear evidence of this happening.

Despite the unusual nature of this discovery, it fits with what scientists already know about the dietary habits of ancient hominins. Meat eating has been a human practice for millions of years, and the fact that evidence of it would emerge in a new location is not really all that surprising.

For his part, Advait Jukar is certain that ample evidence of humans butchering and consuming animals of all sizes must exist and still be waiting to be discovered.

“The thing I’ve come to realize after many years is that you just need a lot more effort to go and find the sites, and you need to essentially survey and collect everything,” Jukar said. “Back in the day when people collected fossils, they only collected the good skulls or limb bones. They didn’t collect all the shattered bone, which might be more indicative of flakes or breakage made by people.”

Top image: Indian scientists survey Palaeoloxodon (elephant) fossil and stone tools excavated nearby.

Source: Advait Jukar/Florida Museum of Natural History

By Nathan Falde