The untold story of the little finger
"The unexpected importance of the fifth digit during stone tool production", Alastair J.M. Key et al, Nature, 13 November 2019), it’s the production of stone tools. Ancient stone tools were made of flint, primarily because it’s a stone that is easy to shape, yet maintains a sharp edge and is hard enough to cut or strike with.
The tools are produced by a process known as “knapping", used even today to shape flint. A knapper will typically hold a large chunk of flint in one hand, brace it against her thigh, and bring her knapping instrument down sharply on the edge of the flint. If she’s done it right, a flake breaks off the chunk.
It has sharp edges, which means it can itself become an arrowhead, or the point on a spear. Meanwhile, the knapper will probably want to keep on hitting the chunk of flint, breaking off still more flakes. Maybe you have a picture in your mind of how the chunk gets shaped in this way, eventually resembling a teardrop with a sharp point and edges.
This is your regulation Stone Age hand-axe. Note that the knapper used both her hands for this job. One, to hold the chunk of flint.
The second, to grip the knapping instrument. Relevant to this discussion, she used the fifth finger on both hands. If you think about it—better yet, imagine yourself doing the knapping—you’ll know how this works.
Try holding a fist-sized object without using your little finger. You’ll quickly realize that you don’t really have a reliable grip on it; sometimes you might even put that finger under the object to support it. But even if you don’t do that, you can feel the pressure the fifth finger exerts as part of your grip.
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