Archaeologists have found an ancient stone tool dating back 15,800 years in the high desert of eastern Oregon.

This tool is probably one of the oldest objects ever uncovered in any human civilization known to live in the western continental U.S. The tool was found in Rimrock Draw Rockshelter near Riley, Oregon.

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The tool is actually an agate scraper made from a piece of orange agate not indigenous to eastern Oregon. It was uncovered beneath eight inches of an ashfall layer some 12 feet under the surface of the ground. This ashfall layer came from an eruption of Mount St. Helens 15,800 years ago.

The discovery of this ancient tool from a layer of undisturbed ash suggests this tool is most likely older than 15,800 years old and could link back to the oldest human occupation in the west Rockies, according to Scott Thomas who is a U.S. Bureau of Land Management Burns District archaeologist.

Traditionally, the Clovis people were the first race to migrate from Asia to North America. This human migration dates to around 13,000 years ago, which is also the date of the oldest known Clovis artifacts.

If further analysis proves the tool is indeed older than 15,800 years old, this tool will be considered among other important archaeological finds earlier than Clovis culture.

The scraper was found to have blood on it. It was later analyzed and revealed it was used to scrape material from a form of bison or a modern buffalo ancestor known as Bison antiquus. At the end of the Pleistocene era, this region was populated by camels, mastodons and mammoths.

The land where the tool was discovered is owned by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management that announced this rare, archaeological find.

Thomas apparently found this tool when he noticed a sage bush growing in front of an old lava flow. This is often a sign deep sedimentary deposits lie below the surface.

This also suggests an ancient stream bed could probably have provided water for an old human settlement. Evidence also depicts frequent controlled fires may have been used for cooking.

Tagsancient stone tool, Oregon, pre-historic human civilization, Clovis