On January 12, 2026, in Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa, a bunch of poisoned arrows that are 60,000 years old from the Stone Age were dug up. Scientists believe the arrows were 60,000 years old through the process of Carbon Dating, which is a method archeologists and paleontologists use to discover the age of organic material of an ancient artifact or fossil. The arrowheads were discovered to be poisoned through chemical analysis, which showed plant toxins on the arrowheads. The toxins were identified as chemicals found in a plant called gifbol or poisonous onion.
During this research study, scientists have discovered that these chemicals would have made the targets that the people used the arrows on, which would have weakened their prey and allowed the prey to slowly die, so the hunters could easily catch their prey. Also, the ends of the poisoned arrows show that the hunters that used them were able to think in very complicated ways because from the research that they’ve gathered, the chemicals in the poison probably took a while to have an effect, so the hunters had to be able to understand how the chemicals worked and how long it took for them to work, and what makes them work.
This allowed scientists to discover that humans from a long time ago had very strong intelligence of the dangerous chemistry of nature, as well as having very strong planning abilities to have thought to poison their arrowheads. This find also shows the oldest remains of poisoned arrows on the planet so far. Scientists believe that Humans were loyal to plants for food and weapons to get food.
These weapons were important to us and to hunters because for us, they provide physical proof of early humans making weapons and for hunters, they needed those weapons for them to easily catch prey to allow them to stay alive. Without these weapons, the hunters wouldn’t be able to catch prey and food easily, and they would probably starve to death.
This discovery was a very significant find for Africa and the world, because if we haven’t discovered the arrowheads, we wouldn’t have more information about the ancient history of the early humans of Africa, and we wouldn’t be able to learn and teach too much about the important topic of archeology, which is the study of fossils and ancient artifacts. archeology helps us to understand the importance of and the history of the past of events and people that happened and were around thousands of years ago. If these arrowheads were found, there could be more ancient history hidden underground, waiting to be discovered! I hope that in the future, more ancient artifacts filled with history will be discovered for us all to learn about.
Resources:
https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-evolution-human-origins/prehistoric-poisoned-arrows-00102434
