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STRUCTURAL WOOD · AT LEAST 476,000 ± 23,000 YEARS

Kalambo Falls

A construction made with two logs

A notch allowed the two logs to interlock. The wood preserves the work marks.

Museum documentation · free public access, no account required.

DECLARED VISUAL RECONSTRUCTION · AI-GENERATED IMAGE · TRACEKEEPERS

Generated reconstruction · Declared visual hypothesis

Declared visual reconstruction, created for museographic contextualisation; not a photograph of the original nor does it constitute documentary evidence.

Image of Kalambo Falls
DECLARED VISUAL RECONSTRUCTION · AI-GENERATED IMAGE · TRACEKEEPERS

Generated reconstruction · Declared visual hypothesis

Declared visual reconstruction, created for museographic contextualisation; not a photograph of the original nor does it constitute documentary evidence.

History and context

In a waterlogged sediment at Kalambo Falls, two crossed logs survived; one was carved with a notch to fit over the other. The exceptional preservation reveals a technology that almost always disappears.

It may have formed part of a platform, walkway or foundation. It is not possible to call it a house nor attribute it to a specific human species.

Evidence and interpretation

Notch, work marks, association and luminescence dating are documented. Function and human author are unknown.

Catalogue facts

Date
At least 476,000 ± 23,000 years
Location
Kalambo Falls · Zambia
Material
Worked and assembled wood
Caution
Not a proven house

A closer look

About 1 min to read · 1 section. Further reading and sources · free access. Editorial review recorded: .

The age is in the sediment, not a tree ring

At Kalambo, luminescence allowed dating of the sediments associated with the logs, a timescale beyond the usual reach of radiocarbon. The study also identifies wooden tools in later levels: a wedge, a digging stick and cut pieces. The structure is therefore not an isolated rarity of a world that only knew stone. Its preservation under water reveals how much may be missing in dry sites, where such technology would not have left recognisable wood.

Location and territory

Physical world map with routes of human evolutionPresent-day world coastline from Natural Earth in an equirectangular projection. The overlaid markers let you explore each milestone.Map base: Natural Earth 1:110m · public domain · present-day reference coastline

LOCATED SITE

Kalambo Falls · ZambiaMarker of the archaeological complex near the falls.

Sources and references

Open the institutional record and expand the object

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