Stone Age Applies for Name Change to Wood Age

The Stone Age may have a branding problem. Neanderthals weren't just chipping away at rocks. They made wooden spears, possible containers, structural supports and at least one object unlike anything archaeologists have seen before. Almost all of that technology disappeared.

Wood rots. Stone doesn't. But at Abric Romaní, a rock shelter near Barcelona, wooden objects left impressions in travertine, a calcium-rich rock that preserved their shapes and grain long after the wood vanished. Other pieces survived as charcoal or actual timber.

Researchers reviewed nearly 600 wooden remains dating from 62,000 to 40,000 years ago. Their study, published in Science Advances, identified 13 pieces linked to Neanderthal use or manufacture. The rest included trunks, roots and firewood.

One object resembles a club, with a narrow handle and a swollen, lopsided head. Researchers believe its shape was deliberate, but its purpose remains unknown. Nothing quite like it has been found at another Old Stone Age site.

Other finds included two spears, a mysterious tripod, possible trays for carrying food or drink, and poles that may have supported structures. The woodworking appears across archaeological layers spanning thousands of years, suggesting it was a regular part of Neanderthal life.

Chris Stringer of London's Natural History Museum cautions that one site offers only a glimpse of a largely vanished toolkit. The findings don't prove Neanderthals used more wood than stone. They reveal how much evidence may have rotted away.

The Stone Age isn't necessarily losing its name. But wood has a convincing claim to co-billing.

Read the full story at New Scientist, October 7, 2026

Hot Take: Naming an entire age after the material that survives was never a description. That's not a Stone Age. That's survivorship bias.