World's Oldest

Horses were likely the first “vehicle” humans used to travel faster and farther, but when exactly did we start riding them? Scientists have now found archeological evidence that suggests horseback riding started some 5,000 years ago.

Most of what we know about ancient extinct animals comes from their bones, since soft tissues don’t usually fossilize well. But now, scientists have discovered the oldest preserved vertebrate brain, in a fossilized fish almost 320 million years old.

The record for world’s oldest surviving DNA has been shattered. An international team of scientists has discovered DNA dating back 2 million years, preserved in Ice Age sediment that captures an entire ecosystem of known – and unknown – lifeforms.

Scientists have discovered the earliest evidence of cooking food through controlled use of fire, dating back 780,000 years. An archeological site in Israel contains fish remains that, on closer examination, show clear signs of having been cooked.

Soft tissues don’t fossilize well, so scientists have to infer organ anatomy from bones. But an unexpected treasure trove of new information has been discovered in Australia, with a 380-million-year-old fish fossil preserving the oldest heart ever found.

Archeologists have discovered the oldest evidence of a surgical procedure in humans. A Stone Age hunter-gatherer, who lived more than 30,000 years ago, had a carefully amputated leg, making it the earliest known surgery by tens of thousands of years.

One of the best ways to analyze Earth's past climate is with samples drilled from deep ice cores. Now, scientists have dated what may be the world’s oldest ice core, with some sections potentially preserving samples as old as 5 million years.

Exactly when humans first set foot in North America remains a mystery, but archeologists have now uncovered the oldest unambiguous evidence. Human footprints have been found at White Sands National Park in New Mexico, dated to about 22,000 years ago.

A new study published in the journal Nature is describing the extraction and sequencing of the oldest known sample of DNA. The sample comes from an ancient species of mammoth found in the Siberian permafrost and dates back nearly 1.2 million years.

Archaeologists have discovered what they claim to be the oldest example of figurative art made by human hands. An ochre painting of pigs, found on a cave wall in Indonesia, has been dated to be at least 45,500 years old.

​For three years, an international team of scientists surveyed the floor of the Black Sea, off the coast of Bulgaria. Now, radiocarbon tests have confirmed that the remains of an ancient ship discovered last year date from 400BC, officially making it the world's oldest known intact shipwreck.

A crude but working calendar found in Warren Field, Scotland, is turning back time. Scientists believe the calendar was created by hunter gatherers around 8,000 BC, making it the world's oldest calendar discovered to date by a significant margin.