Ancient artwork: A handout image released by Griffith University showing a 51,000-year-old artwork spotted in in 2017. — AFP
IT may not look like much – just a flaking image of three people around a big red pig.
But the humble cave painting discovered in Sulawesi is the oldest known narrative artwork ever made by human hands, dating back more than 51,000 years, new research said on Wednesday.
“This is the oldest evidence of storytelling,” Maxime Aubert, an archaeologist at Australia’s Griffith University, told AFP. Aubert was part of the team that identified the previous record holder in 2019, a hunting scene found in a nearby Indonesian cave then estimated to be nearly 44,000 years old.
The latest discovery, which was dated using a new laser technique, marks “the first time we’ve passed the 50,000-year barrier”, said Aubert, a co-author of a new study in Nature describing the find.
That early humans were able to tell such a “sophisticated” story through art could rewrite our understanding of human cognitive evolution, he added.
“Our discovery suggests that storytelling was a much older part of human history ... than previously thought,” study co-author archaeologist Adam Brumm told a press conference.
For the discovery, the researchers used a new method that uses lasers and computer software to create a “map” of rock samples.
This laser ablation technique is more precise, easier, quicker, cheaper, and requires much smaller rock samples than the previous uranium series method, Aubert said. The team first tested the new technique on the previous record holder.
It determined that the hunting scene was actually at least 48,000 years old – 4,000 years older than the uranium series method determined in 2019. The team then tried the laser method out on a previously undated painting first spotted in a cave on Indonesia’s Sulawesi island in 2017.
It was found to be at least 51,200 years old, smashing the previous record. The painting, which is in poor condition, shows three people around a wild pig.
“We don’t know exactly what they’re doing,” Aubert admitted.
He speculated that the paintings were likely made by the first group of humans who moved through South-East Asia before arriving in Australia around 65,000 years ago.
“It’s probably just a matter of time before we find samples that are older,” Aubert added. — AFP
