Introduction. It is generally accepted that the progress in stone processing technology in the Paleolithic noted by archaeologists has always been an indirect reflection of the evolution of the intellectual abilities of our ancestors. Researchers associate the appearance of the first traces of human presence with the finds of the first tools or with the emergence of some innovations in the process of their production. There is no consensus in archeology on the difference between the results of the labor of the first men and the traces of work with stone by other primates. In this paper, criteria are proposed that allow us to identify signs of the use of special technologies in the manufacture of ancient tools, which are characteristic exclusively of humans, which made it possible to clearly determine the marker of the beginning of our history.
Methods and materials. The main research methods are technological analysis of the production of stone tools in the Paleolithic era and trace analysis of human tools. Both methods are based on experimental and comparative studies of reference and archaeological collections of stone artifacts obtained as a result of excavations of Paleolithic sites in Africa and Eurasia.
Results. The conducted analysis recorded the appearance of two unique phenomena in the history of ancient technologies. 1. The peculiarity of human technological thinking when working with stone was manifested not only in the ability to use a fairly wide range of technical methods of influencing the processed material, but also in the human ability to volume’s modeling (planning) the process of stone knapping. Traces of the implementation of two different approaches to splitting stone are clearly recorded in the experimental and technological analysis of ancient stone products of the Early Paleolithic era and can be used as an archaeological marker of the beginning of the genus Homo. 2. Studies of the development of ancient technologies recorded the time of appearance in the toolkit of our ancestors of the first non-utilitarian (not used in everyday work) tools, the purpose of which can be confidently interpreted as tools for performing cult actions that radically distinguish man from the primitive primates that lived synchronously with him.
Discussion. A special phenomenon in the history of the Paleolithic was the traces of man's first irrational actions of stone knapping, not oriented towards the production of utilitarian tools, recorded as a result of technological research. The discovery and analysis of traces of such processes gives grounds for interpreting them as the performance of the first religious rites.
Conclusion. The theses presented in this work about religiosity as the main property of man, distinguishing him from all other primates, are undoubtedly debatable, but the need to search for the most significant markers in the history of man's appearance in the world is always urgent.