This discovery from the Sibudu Cave site means the bedding is 50,000 years older than anything previously found at sites around the world. The compacted layers of bedding—accumulated over time during the site’s occupation—show that it was periodically burned, likely to prevent other pests and contamination from garbage or human excretions.

It’s also entirely possible that the insect-repelling plant layer represents the first known use of plants for medicinal purposes by early humans. The leaves of the tree species in the bedding, Cryptocarya woodii, excrete a chemical that repels insects.

Lyn Wadley, study leader from Johannesburg’s University of Witwatersrand, has said that “the mattresses would’ve been a very comfortable [and] long-lasting form of bedding. Hunter-gatherers tend to live with each other in kinship groups,” so it’s likely that the beds accommodated a whole family.

Although the ancient mattress layers only measured about 2 square meters (and 30cm high), it’s worth keeping in mind that ancient humans tended to be shorter and leaner than today’s average individual. Even if your family couldn’t fit on a space that small—and likely wouldn’t want to, considering the modern notion of “personal space” in Western society—that doesn’t mean humans who lived 77,000 years ago couldn’t sleep there or weren’t comfortable in such close quarters.

“The selection of these leaves for the construction of bedding suggests that the early inhabitants of Sibudu had an intimate knowledge of the plants surrounding the shelter, and were aware of their medicinal uses,” Wadley said. “Herbal medicines would have provided advantages for human health, and the use of insect-repelling plants adds a new dimension to our understanding of behavior 77,000 years ago.”

What were the rest of the mattress layers made of? Various collected grasses, sedges, and rushes… memory foam it wasn’t, but it sure beat sleeping on the cold ground!

In ancient times, the Kingdom of Mali was one of the wealthiest ancient Empires around – after all, it was the source of nearly half the world’s gold. Not surprisingly, this industrious Empire also had its own system of religious beliefs and customs, which included the production of complementary artifacts for those beliefs.

However, archaeologists also suspected that a little more than just plain sculpting went into many African artifacts, such as those from Mali – and so three analytical tests were done on seven Bamana and Dogon sculptures.

The results of the tests revealed that the beautiful, shiny patina on the outside of Malian works of art was created by a secret ingredient: blood. The ‘chemical fingerprint’ of blood showed up on each of the statues, confirming suspicions that these ritual statues were likely used for ceremonies that involved animal sacrifices, which may have made the statues representative of an animal’s death.

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Tomorrow: 2,000 year-old glue sticks!

Inside of a cave in South Africa, archaeologists discovered a half-meter of ancient trash that revealed a surprising amount of information about the people who lived at the cave site about 164,000 years ago. The tens of thousands of years worth of garbage included things like brown mussel shells, animal bones, and other remains of marine invertebrates.

During ancient times, the cave on Pinnacle Point would have been only a few kilometers from the ocean’s shore, which means that whoever lived in the cave had very easy access to the water’s resources – and it’s not too far-fetched to consider that these people probably had open fires on the beach where they ate their meals in good weather.

One odd thing that was found in the garbage was a whale barnacle. However, it probably isn’t that unlikely that – while these people wouldn’t have been sailing out to the sea to hunt whales – if a whale had washed up onshore at a some point, they probably would have eaten the whale and used its parts for resources.

Another thing that was found in the cave was a collection of ochre pieces. Ochre is a soft stone that can be scraped in order to create powders with strong, colorful pigments. The presence of bright ochre in ancient cultures is often associated with things like ritual and symbolism – namely, body painting! Most of the ochre found at the cave was red, so it’s entirely possible that the people living here liked to give each other red temporary tattoos, although the meaning of such decorations is impossible to determine.

Finally, the South African cave also yielded some tiny, sharp blades, often referred to as ‘bladelets’. At less than 10mm wide, they were probably attached to the end of a long stick, in order to create spear points – or they could have been lined up along a piece of wood or rope to create a deadly, barbed weapon.

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Tomorrow: a Peruvian drinking ritual & brewery burning

In southeast Algeria, North Africa, there is a mountain range by the name of Tassili n’Ajjer in the Sahara that is composed of about 300 natural rock arches – and an incredible amount of rock paintings. These rock paintings date as far back as the Neolithic, and include depictions of horses, giraffes, crocodiles, and humans in the midst of cattle herding and hunting!

Some of the earliest pieces of rock art are actually less “paintings” and more “etchings”, as the artists seem to have sketched out images of local wildlife and human interactions, including some wildlife that now are extinct from the area.

In the picture here, there appear to be two female dancers, several big-horned rams, a camel with rider, and… a jellyfish!? Clearly, the jellyfish is rather out of place in this scene, but it attests to geological assertions that the Sahara was habitable for humans during the Neolithic period. In fact, much of the Sahara desert was covered in grasslands and lake basins, with giraffe, crocodiles, ostrich, hippos and antelopes living along the plains.

As usual, there are many theories as to why the Neolithic hunters chose to create so many paintings and etchings on Tassili’s rock arches. Some believe that it was a way to show appreciation to the gods, a symbolic representation of religious beliefs, while others have – perhaps not surprisingly – proposed that the humans in the pictures are actually aliens.

Whatever the reason may have been for creating the extensive rock art at Tassili, one thing certainly remains clear: humans have a penchant for artistic expression, regardless of the time or place. Perhaps they were merely creating art for art’s sake?

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Tomorrow: Crossbow history