Thanks.
> On Sep 13, 2018, at 1:50 PM, Diana Tomchick > <diana.tomch...@utsouthwestern.edu> wrote: > > ‘Hashtag’ pattern drawn on rock in South African cave is 73,000 years old. > > https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06664-y > > Sometime in the Stone Age, human artists began experimenting with a new form > of visual art: drawing. Now, from the ancient rubble that accumulated on the > floor of a South African cave comes the earliest-known example — an abstract, > crayon-on-stone piece created about 73,000 years ago. > > “If there is any point at which one can say that symbolic activity had > emerged in human society, this is it,” says Paul Pettitt, an archaeologist at > Durham University, UK, who was not involved in the discovery. The find is > described in a paper published on 12 September in in Nature. > > Prehistoric people (Homo sapiens) lived in and around South Africa’s Blombos > Cave between 100,000 and 72,000 years ago. Earlier excavations had already > indicated that they were an arty bunch: archaeologists have uncovered beads > at the site fashioned from sea-snail shells, as well as pieces of bone and > chunks of ochre — a clay mineral rich in iron oxide — engraved with geometric > patterns. > > The archaeologists working at the site — including Christopher Henshilwood of > the University of Bergen in Norway — had also found hints that the cave’s > ancient inhabitants were keen painters. In 2011, the team announced it had > discovered an ancient artistic “toolkit” which included a couple of large > snail shells containing residues of an ochre-rich paint. > > #StoneAgeArt > > Now scientists know the Stone Age cave-dwellers liked to draw, too. In > 73,000-year-old deposits at the site, Henshilwood and his colleagues > discovered a four-centimetre-long pebble criss-crossed with nine lines. The > lines appear to have been drawn with an ochre crayon, rather than painted on > the surface. The artwork has given researchers their first insight into how > Blombos cave’s prehistoric inhabitants used ochre as a pigment. > > “With the toolkit we reconstructed how paint was made, but we knew little > about what it was it used for,” says Henshilwood. “With this object we can, > to some extent, study the final product.” > > But it is an incomplete view. The stone pebble was once part of a larger > grindstone — exactly how large is impossible to say, according to the > researchers — and the drawing might have originally covered most of the > smooth grinding surface. > > Team member Francesco d’Errico, an archaeologist at the University of > Bordeaux, France, says that the cross-hatched crayon lines are reminiscent of > patterns engraved on objects found previously at the cave. “The sign was > reproduced with different techniques on different media,” he says. This > suggests it had symbolic importance, although the meaning is unknown. > > “Even nowadays we sometimes don’t understand the reasoning behind an artist > producing a piece of art.” > > Alistair Pike, an archaeologist at the University of Southampton, UK, thinks > that the latest find provides clearer evidence of Stone Age art than some > other discoveries at Blombos and elsewhere. Pike says that there’s no way to > prove that abstract “engravings” were works of art and not simply the marks > left by someone sharpening a tool against a harder surface. “Drawing using > pigment shows a higher level of intentionality,” he says. > > First artists? > > It’s an achievement that Neanderthals might have matched at roughly the same > point in prehistory. Earlier this year, a team including Pike and Pettitt > published evidence that Neanderthals occupying caves in what is now Spain > were drawing on the walls at least 65,000 years ago — although some > researchers have since questioned the age of the artworks. > > It might seem remarkable that early humans and Neanderthals apparently began > drawing at about the same time. That timing could just be coincidence, says > April Nowell, an archaeologist at the University of Victoria in Canada. Finds > of this kind are unusual, she says, so future discoveries might widen the > timing between the origin of drawing in the two species. > > Neither is it so unexpected that the two species both learned to express > themselves through drawing, says Nowell. She says that humans’ “modern” > behaviour developed gradually, and other related species might well have > developed elements of the repertoire themselves. “It shouldn’t be surprising > that aspects are shared with other lineages,” she says. > > doi: 10.1038/d41586-018-06664-y > > > Diana > > ************************************************** > Diana R. Tomchick > Professor > Departments of Biophysics and Biochemistry > University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center > 5323 Harry Hines Blvd. > Rm. ND10.214A > Dallas, TX 75390-8816 > diana.tomch...@utsouthwestern.edu > (214) 645-6383 (phone) > (214) 645-6353 (fax) > > > UT Southwestern > > Medical Center > > The future of medicine, today. > > _______________________________________________ > Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com > Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: > http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ > http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
_______________________________________________ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
