The oldest human footprints ever found outside Africa have been discovered on the beach at Happisburgh in Norfolk, dated to between 850,000 and 950,000 years old. The prints, which were exposed by storm tides last May, were destroyed within a fortnight, but scientists managed to preserve them through casts and 3D photogrammetry.
The footprints suggest a group of at least five individuals, including children, walking southward along an estuary of what was then the Thames. The best-preserved print shows a heel, arch, and four toes, belonging to a man with a foot equivalent to a modern size 8 shoe, indicating a height of about 1.7 metres.
Nick Ashton of the British Museum described the find as 'extraordinarily rare' and said it 'continues to rewrite our understanding of the early human occupation of Britain and Europe.' The prints are more than twice the age of the previous oldest European footprints, found in southern Italy and dated to around 345,000 years.
The footprints are the first direct evidence of humans at the northernmost edge of habitation in Europe. They were dated using overlying sedimentary layers and glacial deposits, as well as fossil remains of extinct animals such as mammoths, an extinct horse, and an early vole. No human fossils have been found, but scientists believe they exist and hope more prints will be exposed by the rapidly eroding coastline.
Professor Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum noted the difficulty of such discoveries, calling it 'a needle in a haystack.' He believes the Norfolk hominids may be related to Homo antecessor from Spain and suggests they became extinct in Europe, replaced by later species.
