Most of the stone artifacts are made out of quartz, sourced from the abundant veins in the nearby Bashan Hill.

The team also found the mandibles, and a femur fragment, of straight-tusked elephants (Palaeoloxodon antiquus), alongside a wealth of fossils, including those of aurochs, red deer, woolly rhinoceroses, elk, sheep, wild boars, as well as small-sized cervids (hoofed animals from the deer family) and small mammals.

"The fossils of straight-tusked elephants and a plethora of stone tools were located in multiple layers, which is rare not only in northern China, but in the entire country," Li says, adding that this has provided important archaeological evidence for the study of early human settlements and livelihoods during the Pleistocene, which lasted from about 2.6 million to 12,000 years ago.

"These ancient inhabitants strategically positioned their settlements close to rivers and sources for stone tools, demonstrating their skill at choosing places to live," Li says.

Fan Chengtai, an official at the archaeology office of the Shandong Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism confirmed the significance of the discoveries at Bashan. "Excavation findings indicate that human development in the region around Yishui continued uninterrupted, illustrating a flourishing scenario in which indigenous inhabitants coexisted with wildlife," Fan says.