Ancient humans already lived in the area of modern-day Israel at least 1.9 million years ago, a new study suggests, pushing back the exodus out of Africa to hundreds of thousands of years earlier than previously thought, a new study just  has suggested.

The study, published this month in the peer-reviewed journal “Quaternary Science Reviews” by a team of Israeli and international researchers, employed several analytical methods to date the prehistoric site of ‘Ubeidiya in the Jordan Valley, south of the Sea of Galilee, which was previously thought to have been occupied between 1.2 and 1.6 million years ago.

The redating of ‘Ubeidiya to 1.9 million years ago means the site was occupied at roughly the same time as a site in Georgia long considered as presenting the earliest evidence of hominins outside of Africa, significantly shaking up what we know about the earliest migrations out of the cradle of human life by modern humans’ ancient ancestors.

Until now, scholars believed that the population living at Dmanisi, Georgia, some 1.9 million years ago represented an earlier group than that living at ‘Ubeidiya, which had different anatomical features and crafted distinct types of stone tools.

But the new study suggests that at least two distinct groups migrated out of Africa at the earliest point we know about.

“Until now, researchers believed that the Acheulian stone-tool tradition found at ‘Ubeidiya was younger than the Oldowan tools discovered at Dmanisi in Georgia,” said Prof. Omry Barzilai of the University of Haifa, one of the authors of the study. “However, the new dating shows that this is not the case. Instead, both tool traditions likely left Africa and reached Eurasia at roughly the same time, around 1.9 million years ago.”

Human evolution can be traced back around 6 million years through fossil and DNA evidence. Hominins are primates that are modern humans’ direct ancestors or closely related to us. Homo sapiens, our modern form, do not appear in the fossil record until around 200,000 to 300,000 years ago.

‘Ubeidiya was first excavated in the 1960s and has since been considered one of the oldest expressions of the Acheulian culture in the world, which was characterized by the creation of two-sided tools such as hand axes, in association with rich collections of fossilized animal remains.

This research marks the........

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