You might have thought that green conservation was a modern concern.

But prehistoric man in what is now Israel was proficient in recycling half a million years ago, scientists have found.

The study from Tel Aviv University not only reveals an admirable distaste for waste among our earliest ancestors, but it also suggests there may have been a deeper-seated reason for recycling: the wish to collect old artefacts to preserve the memory of ancestors and maintain a connection to where they live.

The findings come after researchers found a hoard of flint tools at Revadim, a coastal site west of Jerusalem.

The number of objects unearthed in the dig suggests that this was a popular spot in the prehistoric landscape. The area is also rich with high-quality flint.

A close examination of the tools found there has revealed they are coated in chemicals suggesting many of them had two or more life cycles of use. It seems they were discarded, but years later discovered, reworked, and used again. 

The new owner would typically sharpen their second-hand tool, but keep its basic shape. Each tool might be used for very different purposes at different times. Some were created primarily for cutting, but then repurposed to scrape soft materials such as leather.

Study researcher Bar Efrati said: “The big question is: why did they do it? Why did prehistoric humans collect and recycle actual tools produced, used, and discarded by their predecessors, many years earlier? Scarcity of raw materials was clearly not the reason at Revadim, where good-quality flint is easy to come by. Nor was the motivation merely functional, since the recycled tools were neither unusual in form nor uniquely suitable for any specific use.”

Figure 6

Study professors Ran Barki and Bar Efrati (Tel Aviv University)

Professor Ran Barkai, who worked on the study, suggests that prehistoric people can be compared to a contemporary farmer using his grandfather’s rusty tractor to plough his fields. It might not be the best tool available, but it ties him to his family history.

He said: “Based on our findings, we propose that prehistoric humans collected and recycled old tools because they attached significance to items made by their predecessors. Imagine a prehistoric human walking through the landscape 500,000 years ago, when an old stone tool catches his eye. 

“The tool means something to him — it carries the memory of his ancestors or evokes a connection to a certain place. 

“He picks it up and weighs it in his hands. The artefact pleases him, so he decides to take it ‘home’. 

“Understanding that daily use can preserve and even enhance the memory, he retouches the edge for his own use, but takes care not to alter the overall shape — in honor of the first manufacturer.”