Near a lake in present-day Germany, a group of Neanderthals set up a clever system to get fat from animal bones. They smashed bones with stone tools and boiled them to get the fat. This was not a one-time thing. It happened over 300 years. They did this to avoid a dangerous condition called protein poisoning. Neanderthals were not dumb. They planned ahead. They hunt...

Ochre, a red or yellowish earth pigment, has been around for ages. People in the Middle Stone Age (MSA) used it for more than just art. They had some clever tricks up their sleeves. Imagine using ochre to tan animal hides, make glue for tools, or even protect their skin. But how do we know this? Well, some smart folks dug up seven ochre pieces from Blombos Cave in So...

A long time ago, people lived on the Ryukyu Islands near Japan. No one knows how they got there. The trip was tough because of a super strong ocean current called the Kuroshio Current. To figure it out, scientists built a boat like the ones from that time and tried the journey themselves. They used tools from the Upper Paleolithic era, around 50, 000 to 10, 000 year...