300,000-year-old markings hint at a rare example of Stone Age clothing

• 300,000-year-old cave markings in Germany suggest Stone Age humans were wearing clothes.

• Humans skinned huge cave bears to keep warm, per markings on bones analyzed by experts. 

• It's difficult to assess when humans started wearing clothing because furs don't survive that long.

Humans started wearing clothing as early as the Stone Age, new research suggests.
Tool markings found on the fossilized bones of a 300,000-year-old prehistoric cave bear seem to indicate that humans in Europe skinned the animals, a new study found. 
The markings were found on phalanges, the bones of the bear's paws, discovered near Schöningen, Germany.
There would be no reason for humans to shave bones of the bear's hand unless they were skinning the animal for pelts, scientists concluded.
The findings, published December 23 in the peer-reviewed Journal of Human Evolution, provided some of the earliest evidence of humans wearing clothing.
300,000-year-old markings hint at a rare example of Stone Age clothing: huge cave-bear skins