When and how homo sapiens developed language skills - frontiersin.org
Science does not know exactly when human language emerged, but a recent study shows that Homo sapiens had already developed this skill by at least 135,000 years ago.
The study also suggests that language was the catalyst for the widespread development of modern human behaviors, such as body decoration and the use of symbolic patterns.
Genomic studies suggest that the first division of our species into different populations occurred around this time: 135,000 years ago. The universality of language among modern human populations implies that all lineages originating from the first division of Homo sapiens already had full linguistic capacity. Otherwise, we would expect some modern populations to lack language as we know it, which is not the case.
While this argument does not specify exactly when language arose, it does indicate with good precision the latest moment at which it must have been present. Based on this argument, the article in question proposes that language may have triggered the emergence of modern human behaviors, which spread around 100,000 years ago.