The islands
in the Indonesian archipelago were on the transit route for the early humans
who ended up in Australia. Some of these people would have settled locally in
their tropical paradise, and this was very early indeed in the chronicles of
human migration. “In an Indonesian cave
system known for its prehistoric art, the oldest cave art yet found was hiding
in plain sight. In a cave full of paintings that were well studied over the
years, a faint hand stencil on the ceiling had been overlooked. – A nearby stencil
dated to about 60,900 years ago.” (Callaway 2026)
Overlooked because of its location and being faded. It will be very interesting to see what future results of these studies will produce. There may be much more to learn there.
Having found this overlooked handprint, their next step was to date it. “The oldest minimum-age constraint we obtained is for a hand stencil (sample LMET2) from Liang Metanduno in Muna Island. This motif is partly covered by ancient coralloid speleothems. This stencil is in a poor state of preservation, comprising only a 14 × 10 cm patch of faded pigment bearing a portion of the fingers and the adjoining palm area. The tip of one finger appears to have been artificially narrowed, either through the additional application of pigment or by moving the hand during pigment application, a distinct type of hand stencil art thus far identified only in Sulawesi. Dating results show that this stencil was produced at least 67.8 thousand years ago (ka) (71.6 ± 3.8 ka).” (Oktavian et al. 2026) This dating was apparently made with uranium/thorium dating of rock deposited over the surface of the handprint. This means that the higher figure of 71.6 thousand years could, in fact, be close to the accurate date.
In ages of lowered sea levels the Indonesian archipelago could have been transited on foot, and at times of higher sea level early rafts or boats would suffice for population movement. “It’s not yet clear whose hands made the prints. They could be from an ancient human group called Denisomans who lived in the area and may have interacted with our Homo sapiens ancestors before eventually going extinct. Or they may belong to modern humans venturing away from Africa, who could have wandered through the Middle East and Australia around this time. Fine details on the cave art, including the intentionally modified fingertips, point to a human hand.” (Ramakrishnan 2026) While we are pretty sure that early humans were here because of their early arrival in Australia, we cannot know for certain that Homo sapiens made these prints. As Ramakrishnan states it is possible that Denisovans also could have been in that area although there is not yet any corroborating data for that. We must remember that “absence of evidence is not evidence of absence” (although this quote is usually attributed to Carl Sagan its first uses can be traced back to the 1890s).
This
narrowing of the fingertip is very interesting. “Consistent with a style that has, so far, only been found on Sulawesi,
the hand is depicted with pointy, clawlike fingers. Researchers believe the style
might serve to emphasize the close connection between humans and animals, which
is “something we already seem to see in the very early painted art of Sulawesi,
with at least one instance of a scene portraying figures that we interpret as
representations of part-human, part-animal beings,’ said study co-author Adam
Brumm of Griffith University in a statement.” (Callaway 2026) I am assuming
that this part-human, part-animal interpretation is seeing the narrowed
fingertips as portrayals of hands with claws. This is something that I have to
take with a grain of salt. While therianthropic figures mixing human and animal
traits are common in rock art the world over a picture of a handprint with
narrow fingers does not strike me as related.
REFERENCES:
Callaway, K.R., 2026, Oldest cave art ever found discovered in Indonesia, www.scientificamerican.com. Accessed online 21 January 2026.
Faris, Peter, 2025, A newer candidate for the oldest rock art – a 66,000+ year old hand print, 18 January 2025, RockArtBlog, https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/7760124847746733855/3761715241354171606
Oktavian ,Adhi Agus et al., 2026, Rock art from at least 67,800 years ago in Sulawesi, Nature online, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09968-y.
Ramakrishnan, Adithi, 2026, Indonesian handprints are the oldest cave art found yet, 21 January
2026, Associated Press. Accessed online 2 February 2026.
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