Vestige of a beginning?

The stage was set for life probably 4.4 billion years ago, but I don’t know if the actors were present.

-- Stephen J. Mojzsis, quoted in an article reporting suggestions that life may have originated in the Hadean period, considerably earlier the 3.83 billion years old trace of life claimed hitherto.

The rocks themselves

Rocks and life evolved in parallel. It's so obvious - you wonder why we geologists didn't think of it before.

says Robert Hazen to New Scientist. But the word "evolve" in this context should be treated with caution, as Hazen says here:

Mineral evolution is obviously different from Darwinian evolution—minerals don’t mutate, reproduce or compete like living organisms. But we found both the variety and relative abundances of minerals have changed dramatically over more than 4.5 billion years of Earth’s history.

The living rock

Erwan Roussel and colleagues help extend the known range of life with evidence suggesting that the sub-sea-floor biosphere extends to at least 1600 meters below the sea floor and probably deeper, with an upper temperature limit for prokaryotic life of at least 113°C (see this article, part of a special issue on microbial space in Science).

This would surely have pleased Imre Friedman.