Earliest evidence of elephant butchery at Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania) reveals the evolutionary impact of early human megafaunal exploitation

The role of megafaunal exploitation in early human evolution remains debated. Occasional use of large carcasses by early hominins has been considered by some as opportunistic, possibly a fallback dietary strategy, and for others a more important survival strategy. At Olduvai Gorge, evidence for megafaunal butchery is scarce in the Oldowan of Bed I but becomes more frequent and widespread after 1.8 Ma in Bed II, coinciding with the emergence of Acheulean technologies, but not functionally related to the main Acheulian tool types. Here, we present the earliest direct evidence of proboscidean butchery, including a newly documented elephant butchery site (EAK). This shift in behavior is accompanied by larger, more complex occupation sites, signaling a profound ecological and technological transformation. Rather than opportunistic scavenging, these findings suggest a strategic adaptation to megafaunal resources, with implications for early human subsistence and social organization. The ability to systematically exploit large prey represents a unique evolutionary trajectory, with no direct modern analogue, since modern foragers do so only episodically.

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Fig. 3. Photogrammetry (left) and planimetry (right) of the EAK site in 2022 and 2023. The site-wide distribution of materials, lithics (blue) and bones (red), topographic profiles, and the 3D terrain model are shown.

References

Manuel Dominguez-Rodrigo M., Enrique Baquedano E., Abel Moclan A., David Uribelarrea D., Jose Angel Corre-Cano J. A., Fernando Diez-Martin F., Alejandro Velazquez-tello A., Elia Organista E., Eduardo Mendez-Quintas E., Marina Vegara-Riquelme M., Agness Gidna A., Audax Mabulla A. 2026 – Earliest evidence of elephant butchery at Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania) reveals the evolutionary impact of early human megafaunal exploitation – eLife 14:RP108298 – https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.108298.5