Overview
- Scientists tested ten quartz-backed points from Umhlatuzana Rock Shelter dated to about 60,000 years and detected plant alkaloids on five artifacts.
- Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry identified buphandrine (also spelled buphanidrine) and epibuphanisine, compounds associated with the gifbol plant Boophone disticha.
- Comparable toxin residues were found on roughly 250-year-old arrows in Swedish museum collections, reinforcing the source identification.
- Geochemical and magnetic analyses corroborated the artifacts’ age, and the slow-acting poison implies planned tracking and causal reasoning during hunts.
- The discovery pushes back the earliest direct proof of poisoned weapons by tens of thousands of years, with continuity and regional prevalence still to be determined.