Amidst the fishy debris was a broken fish hook fashioned from shell, which the team dated to between 16,000 and 23,000 years. “This is the earliest known example of a fish hook,” says O’Connor.

Researchers say the world’s oldest fish hooks were meticulously shaped out of sea snail shells and found in Sakitari Cave on Okinawa Island in Japan. CNN values your feedback 1.