Exploring The Olduvai Gorge : Olduvai Gorge is located in Ngorongoro Conservation Area, just on your why toward Serengeti National Park. Olduvai Gorge is also known as the cradle of mankind, to tell that it is the place where the skull of man was discovered. It is one of the best historical sites being recommended by various historians and archaeologists. It is a paleanthropogical historical site which is situated in the eastern sides of the Serengeti Plains. Olduvai Gorge is located within the boundaries of one of the famous national parks in the country known as Ngorongoro conservation area. The Ngorongoro conservation area is located on the northern part of Tanzania, along the Northern Safari Circuit of Tanzania.
This historical cradle of mankind is a steep sided ravine which consist two branches. These branches are having a length which is once combined together it will be about 30 miles (which is equal to 48 kilometers). The depth of this Gorge is almost 295 feet which is approximating to 90 meters deep. Olduvai Gorge is the area where the deposits of man were discovered, which is believed to have experienced life of about a life span of almost 2.1 million to 15,000 years ago. It is in this site where the deposits yielded the remained fossils of more than 60 members of the hominids (human lineage). The discovery of these fossil deposits provided the continuous record of well known human evolution that is believed to be experienced of about two million years past.
Olduvai Gorge is also the site that covers the well – known record of the archeology discovering the development of industries that were making stone oriented tools. The mankind’s cradle was then recognized and designated part of the great education, science and cultural international organization known as UNESCO in 1979.
Although Olduvai Gorge is often being recognized as the world heritage historical site popularly known as cradle of mankind, the famous historical and world heritage site that is popularly known as the mankind’s cradle is situated in the southern part of Africa, South Africa.
The name Olduvai Gorge originated from the local name “Olduwai” or “Oldupai”. It is also called cradle of mankind because it is believed to be the only site where the remains and fossils of the first human creature or human being to walk on the earth’s surface was found.
Being one of the remarkable and renowned archaeological sites in east Africa and perhaps even in the entire world, Olduvai Gorge is one of the richest sites that are remarkably known as chronicles of the human ancestors. Olduvai Gorge is very rich of the history of the evolution of human being, hence it is also considered as the great source of the evolution of the great ecosystem of Serengeti.
The substantial evidences that was conducted through scavenging and hunting discovered that the human fossils that is said to be living in the area almost about 1.9 million years and 1.7 million years used to spend their lives on gathering and collecting various wild foods such as wild plants like tubers, berries and roots.
Since then, the Olduvai Gorge has been one of the world’s well – known significant and important places for historians who are interested on studying about human evolution. The existence of stone tools is also believed to have existed in this site due to the presence of various stone tools that believed to be used by first human being to exist on earth’s surface. These tools were hammer stone that was discovered at the site and it is believed to have existed for almost about 1.85 and 1.6 million years ago. The hard pebble (hammer stone) was believed to be used for knocking flakes off in other stones to make them sharp tools.
In early 1960s, the famous archaeologist, Mary Leakey and her son Jonathan believed to have discovered another form of hominid at Olduvai Gorge that was believed to be smaller than the former one. Mary Leakey and her son believed that the current discovery was certainly different from the former one and was believed to be more advanced compared to the former ones. Hence, they decided to name it a homo habilis meaning a handy human that is said to be the first human being to use tools and more important, the advanced tools such as hammer stones that could be used in sharpening other tools such as stones to be more sharpened and advanced edges.
It is in this significant and great archaeological site where human being is believed to have started to use bipedal life shortly before the advent of making tools. This event was considered to have left the footprints of the cultural way of life of the ancient man and it is defined as the beginning of the cultural stability of our ancestors.
