At around 1.2 million years old, this hand axe is one of the oldest objects in the Museum’s collection, and one of the most significant. It was found in the Olduvai Gorge in northern Tanzania, and was skilfully made by ancestors we would recognise as becoming human. Made from a hard green lava called phonolite, it would have taken a long time to make, and tools like this would have been used for woodcutting or cutting meat. The symmetrical beauty of early hand axes suggests they also could have