First human language

Based on archaeological fossil evidence and genetic data, it seems likely that human language (as opposed to more primitive sound-based animal communication, such as alarm calls) is at least as old as the anatomically modern Homo sapiens who existed 150,000–200,000 years ago. However, with early H. sapiens fossils now dated to c. 300,000 years, its origins are far from clear, and in some form it may date back still further, and nor is it necessarily even exclusive to our species.

The ability to articulate is believed to have been dependent upon physical changes in the height of the larynx (voice box), which was more ape-like prior to 2 million years ago. The discovery of a human-like hyoid (a bone which supports the tongue and is integral to speech) at the Sima de los Huesos site in the Sierra de Atapuerca, Spain, indicates that even early Neanderthals (H. neanderthalensis) may perhaps have been capable of some form of speech as far back as 430,000 years ago.

Even so, cognitive ability – also imperative for language development – is harder to ascertain. Although these Neanderthal hyoid bones are anatomically similar to those of modern humans, their presence alone does not conclusively prove that their owners had developed language. Some palaeontologists argue that the rise of symbolic and abstract behaviour with H. sapiens – such as making engravings – supports the idea that true compositional language (i.e., the ability to construct sentences and apply different tenses) originates with early modern humans.

Scientists had previously speculated that the bones dated back to 530,000 years ago. In 2012, however, palaeontologist Chris Stringer revised this down by 100,000 years, a hypothesis that is at present widely accepted. He argued that the bones were those of an archaic form of Neanderthal.

The Sima de los Huesos ("Pit of Bones") site dates from the middle Pleistocene, or Chibanian period (770,000 years ago to 126,000 years ago). This location is also the source for the oldest extracted human DNA, the earliest evidence of hominin cannibalism and the richest human fossil site.