45,500 year old pictograph of Sulawesi warty pig, Leang-Tedongnge Cave, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Internet photo, Public Domain.
Rock art researchers in Indonesia have announced the discovery of another candidate for the oldest representative rock art image, a picture of a Sulawesi Warty Pig found in a cave on the island of Sulawesi. “The warty pig from Leang Tedongnge cave dates to at least 45,500 years ago, making it the earliest known representational work of art in the world.” (Sci-News 2021)
“Leang Tedongnge cave: The cave is located at the foot of a limestone karst hill. - (The) rock art panel is located on a ledge toward the rear of the cave and features at least three large figurative paintings of pigs.” (Brumm 2021)
“The Celebes warty pig (Sus celebensis), also called Sulawesi warty pig or Sulawesi pig, is a species in the pig genus (Sus) that lives on Sulawesi in Indonesia. It survives in most habitats and can live in altitudes of up to 2,500 m (8,000 ft). It has been domesticated and introduced to a number of other islands in Indonesia.
The Celebes warty pig is a medium-sized pig, and quite variable in size and appearance. It is the only pig species that has been domesticated apart from the wild boar; being semi-domesticated may have had an influence on the variability of its appearance. This pig has a head-and-body length of between 80 and 130 cm (30 and 50 in) and a long tail, with males generally being larger than the females. The back is rounded and the legs short. The colour is greyish-black, sometimes tinged with red or yellow on the flanks. There are three pairs of facial warts and a fringe of pale bristles on the snout and more bristles on the cheeks.” (Wikipedia)
32,000 year old pictograph of Sulawesi warty pig, Leang-Balagajia 1 Cave, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Photograph Sci-News.
Another large warty pig painting was found in the nearby cave of Leang Balagajia 1. “The result of Uranium-series dating provided respective minimum ages of 45,500 and 32,000 years for the Sulawesi warty pig images at Leang Tedongnge and Leang Balagajia 1.” (Sci-News 2021)
A previous candidate for oldest representative pictograph was from the island of Borneo. The island of Borneo is separated from Sulawesi by a little over 100 miles of water in the Makassar Strait. A limestone cave in eastern Borneo contained a red painted figure of a wild cow known as a Banteng (Bos javanicus) that was dated by uranium-thorium dating of a calcium carbonate layer at 40,000 ybp. This displaced another figure from Sulawesi as the oldest previously known representative pictograph. “Previously, the oldest known animal painting in the world was an approximately 35,400-year-old babirusa, or ‘pig-deer,’ on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.” (Faris 2018)
Then we were notified of another find on Sulawesi in a cave named Liang Bulu’Sipong 4.
“Across a 4.5 meter (14.8 foot) section of rock wall, 3 meters (9.8 feet) above the floor of a hard-to-reach upper chamber of a site called Liang Bulu’Sipong4, wild pigs and dwarf buffalo called anoa face off against a group of strangely tiny hunters in monochrome dark red. A dark red hand stencil adorns the left end of the mural, almost like an ancient artist’s signature.
Lieng Bulu’Sipong 4 is a living cave, still being reshaped by flowing water, and layers of rock have begun to grow over the painting in spots. The minerals that form those layers included small traces of uranium, which over time decays into thorium-230. Unlike the uranium, the thorium isn’t water-soluble and can only get into the rock via decay. By measuring the ratio of uranium-234 to thorium-230 in the rock, archaeologists can tell how recently the rock layer formed.
The deposits have been slowly growing over the hunting mural for at least 43,900 years, which means the painting itself my be even older than that.” (Smith 2019)
So, we have a range of painted animals from roughly the same region with a date spread of from 32,000 to 45,500 BP giving us new candidates for the oldest representative images now known. The discovery of this cluster of very old rock art from the same region in the last few years suggests that there is a vast amount left to learn about prehistory in southeast Asia and the islands which might require serious reappraisal of our preconceptions about prehistory and the rise of humanity.
NOTE: Some 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:
Brumm, Adam, et al., 2021 Oldest Cave Art Found in Sulawesi, 13 January 2021, Science Advances, Vol.7, No. 3, https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/7/3/eabd4648
Faris, Peter, 2018 Borneo Cave Art Claimed World’s Oldest Animal Image, 14 November, 2018, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com
Sci-News Staff, 2021 45,000-Year-Old Sulawesi Warty Pig Painting Found in Indonesian Cave, January 14, 2021, http://www.sci-news.com/archaeology/sulawesi-warty-pig-paintings-09250.html
Smith, Kiona N., 2019 A 43,000-Year-Old Cave Painting Is The Oldest Story Ever Recorded, December 15, 2019, https://arstechnica.com/science.
Wikipedia, Celebese Warty Pig, https://en.wikipedia.orb/wiki/Celebes_warty_pig
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