Earliest Evidence of Hominin Fire Use at Gesher Benot Ya'aqov

Archaeological evidence at Gesher Benot Ya'aqov, Israel, documents controlled use of fire by hominins approximately 780,000 years ago, including burnt flint microartifacts and charred fish remains. Earlier fire use has been proposed at Wonderwerk Cave, South Africa (c. 1 million years ago), and a 2025 Nature study identified fire-making fragments at Barnham, England dating to approximately 400,000 years ago. Controlled fire enabled thermal transformation of food, increasing caloric availability, and represents the earliest documented application of combustion by members of the genus Homo.