Something about a warm, flickering campfire draws in modern humans. Where did that uniquely human impulse come from? How did our ancestors learn to make fire? How long have they been making it?

It's easy to take for granted that with the flick of a lighter or the turn of a furnace knob, modern humans can conjure flames — cooking food, lighting candles or warming homes. For much of our ...

Early humans may have created fire 400,000 years ago, according to evidence unearthed at an archaeological site in England. Although there is evidence that early humans used natural fire in Africa as ...

Something about a warm, flickering campfire draws in modern humans. Where did that uniquely human impulse come from? How did our ancestors learn to make fire? How long have they been making it?

Billy Joel famously sang, we didn't start the fire - it was always burning since the world's been turning. But that's not entirely true. Humans do start fires to cook, to heat, to gather around.

Researchers found evidence that suggests Neanderthals could make fire 400,000 years ago at an archaeological site near Suffolk in the United Kingdom. (Jordan Mansfield / Pathways to Ancient Britain ...

Fragments of iron pyrite, a rock that can be used with flint to make sparks, were found by a 400,000-year-old hearth in eastern Britain. (Jordan Mansfield | Courtesy Pathways to Ancient Britain ...