Archaeologist Hao Li and an international team report finding the first complete Quina tool kit in East Asia, at the Longtan site in southwest China. Quina scrapers are thick, asymmetrical stone tools with durable edges that were known from Europe and the Middle East, where they were used to cut meat, hides and wood and to extract marrow from bones. Luminescence dating of sand grains placed the Longtan layers at 50,000 to 60,000 years old, roughly the same time these tools were used by Neanderthals in Europe. Pollen analysis suggested an open forest-grassland and cool, dry climate similar to European sites. The team could not identify the toolmakers, who might have been modern humans, Neanderthals or Denisovans. Earlier scholars had assumed East Asia skipped the Middle Paleolithic, but the discovery and the Levallois finds at Guanyindong cave suggest otherwise. Researchers will look at deeper layers to learn whether the technology was invented locally or introduced.

Hampi is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, with more than 1,600 surviving remains spread over 4,100 hectares. It was the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire from 1336 to 1565. Travellers from Persia and Portugal described it as a prosperous, wealthy and grand city with temples, markets and farms along the Tungabhadra River. By 1500 it was estimated to be the world's second-largest city after Beijing, and probably India's richest at the time. In 1565 a coalition of Muslim sultanates defeated the Vijayanagara Empire, its capital was conquered and destroyed, and the city was left in ruins. Hampi remains a religious centre, with the active Virupaksha Temple at its heart.