How long has the history of human beings using fire? So far, many archaeologists are still exploring this problem. /kloc-in the 1970s of 0/9, when henry morgan was studying this problem, due to the lack of archaeological data, he could only set the time when humans began to use fire at the middle stage of ignorance, that is, to obtain fish food (equivalent to the late Paleolithic period or the early Mesolithic period) according to the ethnographic data existing in Australians and most Leoneans at that time? People's understanding of the history of human use of fire is still stuck in the concept of tens of thousands of years. 1927 to 1957, a large number of charcoal, ashes, burnt clods, stones, bones and Pu Shu seeds were excavated from Zhoukoudian cultural site in Beijing, as well as the ashes and burnt bones found in Zhoukoudian site earlier than "Beijingers" 13, which broadened people's horizons and changed people's use of mankind. When studying these materials, Mr. Jia Lanpo and Mr. Wu Rukang pointed out that "the use of fire by human beings did not start from the era of Beijingers"? At that time, Beijingers had long-term experience in using fire? In this way, the history of human use of fire was pushed to 550 thousand years ago.

Since the early 1960s, people have found a lot of new evidence of human use of fire in France and China, even earlier than the era of "Beijingers". According to the author's knowledge, in 1960, in the southeast of France, not far from Marseille, workers discovered the oldest traces of fire in Europe-charcoal, burning stones and ashes. There were five traces of braised soil with a diameter of 90 cm on the ground, which can reach 1 10,000 years ago? ④ During the period of1960, Mr. Jia Lanpo and Mr. Wang Jian discovered burnt antlers and limb bones of mammals during their investigation and excavation in Shuhe cultural site in Ruicheng, Shanxi. Was the Shuhe Cultural Site measured by paleomagnetism more than 690,000 years ago? ⑤. 196 1, 1962, Shanxi Provincial Museum discovered some black, gray and gray-green mammals' bones and muscles, antlers, horse teeth, etc. during the excavation of Xihoudu cultural site, which is 3.5 kilometers away from Shihe site. Gray-green horse teeth also split into broken lines, which are no different from the charred bones and teeth of the Peking Man Site. After testing, it was proved to be burnt. "? 6. The absolute age of Xihoudu site determined by paleomagnetism is at least 654.38+800,000 years ago? ⑦. 1966, Lantian human skull fossil from Gongwangling, Lantian, Shaanxi Province, paleomagnetic determination 100 to 800,000 years ago? 8 Black substances were also found in the early accumulation. After testing, they are all carbon, and several large carbon particles can be seen with the naked eye. Archaeologist Dai erjian and others think: "This kind of carbon may be formed when human beings use fire, such as tree trunks or branches, which are not completely burned and then transported to a proper distance by running water." ? ⑨ In the summer of1971,Guizhou Provincial Museum excavated ape-man fossils, other vertebrate fossils and stone tools in the limestone cave of Yunfeng Brigade of Jiuba Commune in Tongzi County, and found several pieces of carbon chips and burnt bones at the same time. ⑩? According to other people's comparative research on the bones of Yan Huidong ape-man and Peking ape-man, Yan Huidong ape-man is about the same age as or a little earlier than Peking ape-man. 1973 In the summer, the Geological Department of Wangjiazhai Coal Mine in Guizhou Province found ashes and mammal fossils in the Nitrate Cave of Yiqi Commune in Shuicheng County. The following year, it was excavated by the Guizhou Provincial Museum and found in the preserved 10 width, 0? 3 ~ 1, thickness 0? 1~0? More than 50 paleolithic materials were obtained in the accumulation of 7 meters, and the thickness of ash layer reached 0? 15m, which contains many burnt bones, burnt stones and a certain number of mammalian fossils. The age of this site is the Middle Pleistocene ⑿. /kloc-0 In the winter of 973, when the origin of Yuanmou-bearing fossils was excavated in Shangnabang Village, Yuanmou County, Yunnan Province, not only the stone tools made by Yuanmou people were found from the strata, but also a large number of carbon chips were found. Most of these carbon chips are mixed in clay and silty clay, and a small amount is also sandwiched in gravel lens, with a deposition thickness of 3 meters. It is worth noting that these carbon chips are often related to mammalian fossils, and some fossil bones still have artificial traces. The largest diameter of carbon particles in carbon chips can reach 65438 0.5 mm, and the smallest is about 65438 0 mm. During excavation, its distribution density was determined by random sampling. On the plane of 4×3 cm, there are as many as 16 carbon particles exceeding 1 mm! When studying this problem, Mr. Jia Lanpo pointed out: "It is reasonable to think that it is the earliest evidence of human use of fire, which is more convincing than using the burning of wildfires in nature." [14] Yuanmou ape-man lived about 1.7 million years ago [13]? .

These data show that the history of human fire use can be gradually advanced from 550,000 years, 690,000 years, 800,000 years, 6.5438+0.5 million years and 6.5438+0.7 million years to 6.5438+0.8 million years ago. Can you push it up? Wait a minute! Let's look back and see how some scholars view the problem of human use of fire after the above findings.

1975 12 In Dialectics of Nature published by Shanghai People's Publishing House, there is a passage in the third section of the chapter "The Future of Mankind" co-authored by Li Bingwen and Paul Hu: "From the perspective of the birthplace of mankind, neither Asia nor Africa is far from the equator. Almost all Australopithecus live in the equator of Africa. Javanese apes 700,000 years ago also lived in hot Indonesia. If there is no fire, can humans still stay in temperate and cold zones? " "Why can Beijingers live near 40 north latitude? Because they were one of the earliest ancestors who used fire.