The capacity to share abstract concepts using language was a key transition in the evolution of communication and in hominin evolution.  This paper argues that the origins of language can be detected one million years ago, if not earlier, in the archaeological record of Homo erectus.  This controversial claim is based on a broad theoretical and evidential foundation that begins with a definition of language as communication based on symbols rather than grammar.  The second component is Peirce’s triadic semiotic progression which distinguishes between icon, index and symbol to identify artefact forms operating at the level of symbols. The third part draws on generalisations about  the multiple social roles of technology in pre-industrial societies and on the contexts tool-use among non-human primates. The resulting theoretical framework establishes an expectation of a deep evolutionary foundation for the capacity to use symbols. That capacity is expressed materially in arbitrary social conventions that permeate the technologies of Homo erectus and its descendants from 1 million years ago.  By extending that capacity to H. erectus we are not denying the achievements of Homo sapiens, we are simply placing them in a broader evolutionary time-frame which accords with current evidence.