Photo of Madagascar cave wall with pictographs, upper right. Internet photo - Public Domain.
One of the most exciting things about rock art is that it can serve as a window on the past, a way to see things that no longer exist, whether it be the lifeways of ancient peoples, or ancient creatures that those people portrayed that are now extinct.
“An international team of scientists has discovered stylistically unique ancient drawings, including the only known prehistoric depiction of a now-extinct giant sloth lemur, on the walls of a rock shelter in western Madagascar. The drawings were discovered by Dr. David Burney from Hawaii’s National Tropical Botanical Garden and his colleagues from the United Kingdom, Madagascar and the United States in Andriamamelo Cave near the small village of Anahidrano.” (Prostak 2020)
“The diversity of lemurs was greater in the past - much greater. Where Africa has its gorillas and Borneo and Sumatra their orang-utans, Madagascar had its giant sloth lemurs (Archaeoindris fontoynonti), which weighed up to 244 kg and were the size of male gorillas.” (Van der Geer 2017)
Sloth Lemur skull (Archaeoindris fontoynontii), Internet photo wikipedia.com - Public Domain.
“The sloth lemurs (family Palaeopropithecidae) are a group of extinct giant lemurs that includes four genera. The common name can be misleading, as these creatures were not closely related to South American sloths. As the name implies, sloth lemurs were designed for treetop living, with long arms and legs, limber joints and hook-like hands and feet. These adaptations allowed them to be adept at both leaping and climbing.” (Prostak 2020)
“Limited scansoriality has been postulated for the gorilla-sized Archaeoindris which has been likened to a ground sloth. However, its very high femoral neck-shaft angle and other highly derived postcranial features which are shared only with Palaeopropithecus, suggest more committed arboreality.” (Godfrey and Jungers 2003:256) (NOTE: Scansorial is defined as capable of, or adapted for, climbing.}
As to the presumed ancient creation of these images we must remember that Madagascar is one of the last places on earth that humanity accomplished the extinction of the native megafauna. “A few may have succumbed only very recently. A specimen of Palaeopropithecus ingens from Ankilitelo in southwest Madagascar was recently radiocarbon-dated at 510-80 PB. Confidence limits on this date include the historical period.” (Godfrey and Jungers 2003:257) So, although the Madagascar Sloth Lemur is indeed extinct, that does not mean the rock art is ancient because the extinction of this animal apparently happened during the early historic period.
While it would be truly exciting to have this turn out to represent the extinct animal that has been designated, I do have a couple of problems with stating that this definitely is a representation of Madagascar’s extinct sloth lemur. First, not one of the authors of the paper has rock art experience or publications in their past that I could determine. Second, although the image in question does look very like a sloth hanging upside down, that pose is almost universally accepted by students of rock art to indicate that the pictured animal is deceased, not a sloth hanging from a tree limb. And if it is not a sloth lemur, but instead a dead quadruped, a great age for this petroglyph is not as likely. I therefore feel that positively identifying this image as Madagascar’s extinct sloth lemur is really going out on a limb.
NOTE: Images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.
REFERENCES:
Godfrey, Laura, and William Jungers,
2003 The Extinct Sloth Lemurs of Madagascar, Evolutionary Anthropology 12:252–263 (2003)
Prostak, Sergio,
2020 Researchers Find Unique Ancient Rock Drawings of Extinct Sloth Lemur, Sept. 7, 2020, http://www.sci-news.com/archaeology/sloth-lemur-drawing-08820.html
Van der Geer, Alexandra
2017 The Late Survival of Madagascar’s Megafauna, Sept. 22, 2017, https://beta.capeia.com/paleobiology/2017/09/22/the-late-survival-of-madagascars-megafauna
SECONDARY REFERENCE:
Burney, David A. et al.
2020 Rock art from Andriamamelo Cave in the Beanka Protected Area of western Madagascar, Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology, published online May 26, 2020; doi:10.1080/15564894.2020.1749735
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment