Porc-Épic Cave, Ethiopia, near Dire-Dawa, has a human mandible and abundant pieces of red ochre, with sandstone chunks used to grind ochre, and pigment-stained artifacts thought to date to between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago.

The site is contemporary with the time that modern humans began their dispersal from the Near East into the rest of Eurasia, and is suggestive of the cultural surroundings of Northeastern Africa at that time.

Photo: Daniela Eugenia Rosso and coworkers