Stone Age Europeans used human bones to make arrowheads

By Michael Marshall

Ancient hunters may have made spearheads or arrowheads from human bone

David Lyons / Alamy

Stone Age hunters in Northern Europe made the sharp ends of their weapons from a surprising raw material: human bone. The choice could have had a symbolic purpose, for example to equip the arrows with the ability of a dead expert hunter.

Before the peasants arrived, Europe was inhabited by Stone Age hunters and gatherers. They roamed a landscape that is different from today. The planet was deep in an ice age, so that a lot of water was trapped in ice sheets at the poles – and at sea level …