A SYMBOLIC REPRESENTATION OF PAIN IN AN ANTHROPOMORPHIC PETROGLYPH?

 Spotted Woman, Picture Canyon, southeast Colorado. Photograph Peter Faris, 1986. Chalking by some unknown vandal.

In Picture Canyon, in southeastern Colorado, are found hundreds of petroglyphs, among them this anthropomorphic figure with circles on the body. On February 6, 2021, I published a column titled “A Petroglyphic Age Notation” in which I broached the possibility that the circles representd the age of the figure based on a symbol in Garrick Mallery’s 10^th annual report of the Bureau of American Ethnology. That symbol, a series of circles with short lines connecting them, was obtained from “The Dakotas”. The lines on the right side of the head of the figure I discussed as representing an ear and head of hair.

In his 2008 book Thunder and Herds, Lawrence Loendorf discussed that same petroglyph and identified the portion of lines on the right side of the head of that anthropomorph as a pain symbol, based upon a resemblance to similar symbols from the Battiste Good winter count that Good had used to represent pain.

Battiste Good, 4th from left. Beside him (2nd from left) possibly his wife Goes in the Midst. Far right his son High Hawk.

Blackens-Himself died in winter of 1724-5, Battiste Good winter count. From Mallery, Fig. 281, page 298.

“Renaud noted the presence of several anthropomorphs, which included the ‘realistic figure of a human body, the most striking petroglyph discovered this season, a woman with sign of smallpox over the body. The interpretation was made more certain after finding four similar drawings in ‘Battiste Good’s Winter Counts’ as given by Mallery in the 10^th annual report of the Bureau of American Ethnology.’” (Loendorf 2008:198)

Loendorf wrote the following about the symbol on the right side of the figures head. “The anthropomorph that Renaud described as a female figure with the ‘sign of smallpox over the body’ is over a meter high and is shown in profile view. Its fleshed-out arms and legs and its round head, eyes, and mouth make it appear more realistic than most rock art representations of humans. Identification of the figure is based on a bulge on its right side that some researchers believe represents a breast, although this is not a convention for designating gender else-where on the High Plains. It is the presence of 16 or 17 circles on the figure’s body that prompted Renaud’s diagnosis of smallpox, which he based on similarities between the circles and mnemonic icons in ‘Battiste Good’s Winter Count’ which are known to represent smallpox.

Not all researchers accept the validity of Renaud’s comparison, supporting their rejection by citing circles that are not indicative of smallpox on similar figures at other rock art sites. Bill Buckles, for example, has pointed out that a similar petroglyph in the Galisteo Basin near Santa Fe, New Mexico, is identified by Pueblo Indians as a representation of Shulawitsi, the Fire God, and that another similarly spotted figure in a painting by George Catlin represents a Mandan spirit.” (Loendorf 2008:199)

The pain symbol from Battiste Good's winter count. Tracing by Peter Faris.

It is true that Mallery illustrated four drawings from Battiste Good’s winter count with a symbol representing internal pain included. The symbol chosen by Good was a representation of the stomach and intestines and in one of his illustrations he shows it to be in the interior of a man’s figure. In the other instances it is used externally. “Battiste Good had developed a fascinating and unique symbol to represent pain. In the 1724-25 image showing “Blackens Himself died winter” he portrays the cause of death. This was assumed to be an intestinal problem and Good shows it as the stomach and intestines in front of Blackens Himself representing his bowels in violent commotion, “going round and round”. Good used this symbol thereafter to illustrate pain in a number of subsequent portrayals.” (Green and Thornton 2007:78)

 

Whorl from the right side of the head of Spotted Woman, Picture Canyon, southeast Colorado. Tracing by Peter Faris.

Close-up of Spotted Woman, Picture Canyon, southeast Colorado. Photograph Peter Faris, 1986. Chalking by some unknown vandal.

Loendorf compared the lines at the right side of the head of the Picture Canyon anthropomorph to Battiste Good’s pain symbol and also a symbol used by the Aztecs to illustrate pain. (Personal communication 10/16/2021)

 

Figure 7.5, page 200, Thunder and Herds, Loendorf, 2008.

"Figure 7.5. On the left is the anthropomorph at Picture Canyon that may be suffering from smallpox. On the right is a composite illustration showing the Battiste Good drawing of smallpox and the Aztec pain symbol. Redrawn by Elaine Nimmo from Mallery 1972:308,313; and Historia De Las Cosas de Nueva Espana, Volume 4, Book 12, Lam, cliii, plate 114, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University." (Loendorf 2008:200)

That particular Aztec symbol is used for breath and speech and could very easily be meant to illustrate pain. If used in conjunction with illness or a wound I would take it to represent a groan or a cry from the pain. But, does that particular portion of the figure with circles from Picture Canyon possess an adequate resemblance to Battiste Good’s pain symbol? 

Spotted Woman, Picture Canyon, southeast Colorado. Photograph Peter Faris, 1986. Chalking by some unknown vandal.

I find it fairly easy to disagree with Renaud’s interpretation, having found many errors in his illustrations and recording of rock art. Pretty much all the accepted representations of smallpox, and especially Battiste Good’s representations, show the small pox pustules as dots or blotches on the body, not as large circles. As I said above I suggested a very different interpretation for the circles on the body, an age count. Disagreeing with Larry Loendorf is a different matter altogether, and I would not do so lightly. His remarkable rock art recording projects set the bar exceedingly high for the rest of us, and he has done remarkable interpretations as well. I will just end by saying that I am uncomfortable with the differences between Battiste Good’s pain symbol and that portion of the Picture Canyon anthropomorph, and, if I doubt that the figure represents a case of smallpox, then it follows that I have to doubt that the figure is expressing pain.

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:

Faris, Peter, 2021, A Petroglyphic Age Notation, 6 February 2021, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com

Greene, Candace S., and Russell Thornton, 2007, The Year The Stars Fell: Lakota Winter Counts at the Smithsonian, Smithsonian National Museum, Washington.

Loendorf, Lawrence L., 2008, Thunder and Herds, Rock Art of the High Plains, Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek, California.

DID A REVERSAL OF THE EARTH'S MAGNETIC FIELD STIMULATE THE RISE OF ROCK ART?

Cave of El Castillo, Spain. Handprints dated to 40,800 years BP. Photo 2012, University of Bristol.

It is fairly well known that the Earth’s magnetic field has been weakening and the North magnetic Pole has been shifting at increasing rates, prompting speculation about a forthcoming reversal of the magnetic field of the Earth, and its effects on the life on Earth. “Over the recent past, Earth’s magnetic field has steadily weakened (~9% in the past 170 years), and this, along with the current rapid movement of the magnetic North Pole, has increased speculation that a field reversal may be imminent. The estimated economic impacts of such a reversal have focused on the increased exposure to extreme solar storms, with multibillion-dollar daily loss estimates likely to be conservative.” (Cooper et al. 2021:1)14

 

As to what impact such a change in Earth’s magnetic field, a recent study, based on new evidence from an ancient C14 sequence looked at the consequences of such an event known as the Laschamps Excursion. “One of the best opportunities to study the impacts of extreme changes in Earth’s magnetic field is the Laschamps Excursion (hereafter Laschamps) – a recent, relatively short-duration (<1000 year) reversal -41 thousand years ago (ka). Sedimentary and volcanic deposits indicate a weakening of the magnetic field intensity to <28% of current levels during the reversed phase of the Laschamps and , notably, as little as 0 to 6% during the preceding transition as polarity switched. (Cooper et al. 2021:1)

 

Cave of El Castillo, Spain. Handprints dated to 40,800 years BP. Photo 2012, University of Bristol.

The researchers found that “a return to periglacial conditions that occurred at 42.23±o.2 ka, coincident with the weakening of the magnetic field during the transition into the Laschamps. The periglacial conditions lasted until the Holocene suggesting pervasive and widespread cold conditions (associated with a strengthening or northward shift in the core westerly airflow) across this sector of the Southern Ocean.” (Cooper et al. 2021:6)

The term ‘periglacial’ refers to conditions at the edge of a glacier, and such conditions could well have driven populations into caves for shelter from the cold.

 

Cave of El Castillo, Spain. Handprints dated to 40,800 years BP. Photo 2012, University of Bristol.

“Overall, the signals – suggest that contemporaneous climatic and environmental impacts occurred across the mid- to lower latitudes ~42 ka, coincident with Earth’s weakened geomagnetic field immediately preceding the reversed state of the Laschamps. We describe this as the ‘Adams Transitional Geomagnetic Event (hereafter ‘Adams Event’), named after the science writer Douglas Adams because of the timing (the number ‘42’) and the associated range of extinctions.” (Cooper et al. 2021:7) The name ‘Adams Event’ was in reference to Douglas Adam’s 1979 book Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy which declared that the answer to the ultimate answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything, was ‘42’.

“These broad-scale atmospheric circulation changes appear to have had far reaching consequences. Within Australia, the peak megafaunal extinction phase is dated at ~42.1 ka, both in the mainland and Tasmania, and has generally been attributed to human action, although well after their initial arrival at least 50 ka. Instead, the megafaunal extinctions appear to be contemporaneous with a pronounced climatic phase shift to arid conditions that resulted in the loss of the large interior lakes and widespread change in vegetation patterns.” (Cooper et al. 2021:7)

Babirusa, 45,500 BP, Leang-Tedongnge Cave, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Internet photograph, public domain.

Although this study was primarily based upon data from the southern hemisphere, its conclusions are applied globally. “For instance, the Adams Event is very close in timing to the globally widespread appearance and increase in figurative cave art, red ochre handprints, and changing use of caves ~40 to 42 ka, e.g., in Europe and Island Southeast Asia. This sudden behavioral shift in very different parts of the world is consistent with an increasing or changed use of caves during the Adams Event, potentially as shelter from the increase of ultraviolet B, to potentially harmful levels during GSM or SEPs, which might also explain an increased use of red ochre sunscreen. Rather than the actual advent of figurative art, early cave art would therefore appear to represent a preservation of preexisting behaviors on a new medium.” (Cooper et al. 2021:7)

This last statement, that the shifting of the Earth’s magnetic field event, had the effect of a “widespread appearance and increase in figurative cave art, red ochre handprints, and changing use of caves” requires some kind of explanation. How could that event actually affect human creativity?

43,900 year old Anoa, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Internet photograph, public domain.

In 2009, Allan Snyder, director for the Center for the Mind at the University of Sydney, published the results of an inquiry into magnetically induced creativity. He stated “We cannot draw naturalistic scenes unless we are taught tricks. This is surprising because our brains obviously possess all of the necessary visual information required to draw, but we are apparently unable to consciously access it for the purpose of drawing. Unlike artistic savants, we tend to be more aware of the meaningful whole than its constituent parts. Snyder et al. (2003) directed low-frequency rTMS (repetetive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation)for 15 minutes over the LATL (left anterior temporal lobe) of 11, right-handed, healthy participants. The participants were given 1 min. to draw a dog, horse or face from memory, before, during, immediately after and 45 min. after rTMS treatment.

Magnetic stimulation caused a major change in the schema of the drawings of 4 out of 11 participants. Two of these also underwent sham (inactive) stimulation either the week before or after the real test. The changes in drawing style were observed only following active stimulation and not after sham stimulation. In some cases, the drawings returned to ‘normal’ 45 min. after rTMS ceased. Several participants reported greater awareness of detail in their surrounds after active rTMS. One participant published his experience, stating that he ‘could hardly recognize the drawings as his own even though he had watched himself render each image.’” (Snyder 2009)

40,000 year old Babirusa, Borneo, Indonesia. Internet photograph, public domain.

While I do not know if Cooper et al. envision the swapping of the Earth’s magnetic poles as some kind of magnetic wave sweeping through the minds of Paleolithic peoples, or if it was the return to full magnetic strength after the decline through the millenia preceding the event that supposedly triggered the creativity of ~42.1 ka, but as they reported, cave painting appeared right around the time of that event on both sides of our globe. In El Castillo cave in Spain handprints and other painted figures have been dated to 40,800 years ago (University of Bristol 2012) and on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi zoomorphic figures in a cave have been dated as early as 43,900 years ago (Smith 2019).

And this did not require every human to be artistically affected. Remember Snyder’s statement “We cannot draw naturalistic scenes unless we are taught tricks”. Even of only a small percentage of the population became this creative, once the first improved images are painted the “tricks” are taught, they can be studied and repeated.

So, did this really happen, I think the jury is still out on this one, but it is sure to attract (magnetically) some thought.

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:

Cooper, A. et al., 2021, A Global Environmental Crisis 42,000 Years Ago, Science, Vol. 371, 19 February 2021, p. 811, doi: 10.1126/science.abb8677.

Snyder, Allan, 2009, Explaining and Inducing Savant Skills: Privileged Access to Lower Level, Less-Processed Information, 27 May 2009, Philosophical Transactions B, The Royal Biological Society, vol. 364, pp,1399-1405

Smith, Kiona, 2019, A 43,900-year-old cave painting is the oldest story ever recorded, 15 December 2019, Ars Technica, https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/12/a-43900-year-old-cave-painting-is-the-oldest-story-ever-recorded/

 

University of Bristol, 2012, Uranium-series dating reveals Iberian paintings are Europe’s oldest cave art, Science Daily, 14 June 2012, www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012,06,120614142840.htm

WHALE HUNTING ARTISTS OF NORTHERN SIBERIA – THE PEGTYMEL PETROGLYPHS:

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Chukotka Travel.

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

One of the interesting things about us humans is the way we relate everything to ourselves. A rock art site in the far northeast corner of Russian Siberia is thought of as being way, way off in an isolated area. Of course, to the people who created the rock art it was not way off or isolated at all, it was their downtown, or at least their home territory.

Originally reported in a 1965 geological survey near the mouth of the Peftymel River, they were first visited and recorded in 1967 and 1968. (Dikov 1971:2)

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Online photograph, public domain.

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph                    Vladimir Devyatkin.

“In all we found 104 groups of illustrations, which we numbered successively for this publication in order of their location on the course of the river. Not all of these groups can be viewed as single compositions. More often they consist of illustrations from different time periods, sometimes lacking not only unity of subject but style and technique of execution. We grouped these petroglyphs only because of their location on the same panel of the cliff.” (Dikov 1971:7-8)

In 2021 another expedition to the site began newly recording all the rock art in detail according to an article in the Siberian Times by Svetlana Skarbo. Although her reporting has a number of factual errors in details it also included magnificent photographs of the area and the rock art from the Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Bear hunt with dogs. Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Online photograph, public domain.

“The spectacular art gallery – was ‘opened’ at least two thousand years ago, when ancient artists embossed petroglyphs on rocks of what is now Chukotka, Russia’s easternmost corner.” (Skarbo 2021)

Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

“The Pegtymel petroglyphs were found by Soviet geologists in 1967 (1965 actually), high above the right bank of the Pegtymel River, a short distance from the East Siberian Sea.” (Skarbo 2021)

“In the summer of this year “the first scientific expedition since 2008 got to the site to start a major project on preserving unique stone drawings as they get destroyed with time. Five archeologists and three volunteers spent two weeks gathering photo material to create 3D models of Pegtymel petroglyphs, and to map the whole ‘gallery’.” (Skarbo 2021)

Whale hunt. Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

Another assumption that we tend to make about people who lived way back then in an “isolated” area is that they are primitive. I cannot believe that any group of people who could hunt whales 2,000 years ago were culturally or technologically primitive. When archaeological work has provided artifacts and actual data about these people we will be able to make assumptions based on reality, but until then we can appreciate the petroglyph record they left us.

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:

Dikov, N. N., 1971, Mysteries in the Rocks of Ancient Chukotka (Petroglyphs of Pegtymel), translated by Richard L. Bland, Nauka Pub., Moscow.

Skarbo, Svetlana, 2021, Whale Hunting and Magic Mushroom People of 2,000-year-old Eurasia’s Northernmost Art Gallery, 14 September 2021, The Siberian Times, Novosibirsk, Russia

SYMBOLS FOR GEOLOGIC PHENOMENA IN ROCK ART – EARTHQUAKES REVISITED:

"Pictogram representing an earthquake that took place on the year 2 Reeds or 1507. The gloss describes that the pictogram recounts the drowning of 1800 warriors in an unidentified river, presumably in southern Mexico, the termination of the temple of the New Fire, where the ceremony of the new cycle of life was celebrated, and a solar eclipse as a circle with rays emanating from it in the upper right-hand side, below the date sign." Suarez and Garcia Acosta, 2021, Fig. 7, page 5.

On Saturday, October 19, 2013, I posted a column on RockArtBlog titled “An Earthquake Symbol Pictograph” about a pictograph in the Stein River Valley of British Columbia, Canada, that was interpreted by a First Nations informant (Annie York) as a symbol for an earthquake. Now a 2021 paper by Gerardo Suarez and Virginia Garcia-Acosta (see references) has identified an Mesoamerican earthquake pictogram and illustrated a number of instances of its use in codexes (actually codices).

“The first written evidence of earthquakes in the Americas is represented as pictograms in codices and annals drafted in the first few years after the Spanish Conquest. The main source of earthquakes in pre-Hispanic times comes from the codex Telleriano-Remensis. There are 12 earthquakes reported in the Telleriano-Remensis, from 1460 to 1542.” (Suarez and Garcia-Acosta 2021:1)

The earthquake symbol from the preceding illustration.

“The Codex Telleriano-Remensis, produced in sixteenth century Mexico on European paper, is one of the finest surviving examples of Aztec manuscript painting. The Codex Telleriano-Remensis is divided into three sections. – The third section is a history, itself divided into two sections which differ stylistically. Pages 25 to 28 are an account of migrations during the 12^th and 13^th centuries, while the remaining pages of the codex record historical events, such as ascensions and deaths of rulers, battles, earthquakes, and eclipses from the 14^th to the 16^th century, including events of early Colonial Mexico.” (Wikipedia)

Movement (ollin) and Earth (tlalli) symbols. Suarez and Garcia- Acosta, 2021, Fig. 7, page 5.

"An earthquake is shown on the year 2 Reeds or 1507. Between the earthquake glyph and the date is the representation of a solar eclipse depicted by a shadow on the Sun." Suarez and Garcia- Acosta, 2021, Fig. 5, page 4.

Suarez and Garcia-Acosta (2021) describe the earthquake glyphs as follows. “Earthquakes, or tlalollin in the original Nahuatal language, are represented by two associated glyphs: movement or ollin and Earth or tlalli. Thus the two signs depicted together represent an earthquake. The glyph ollin represents movement. It is portrayed as four helices and a central circle or eye. The Earth is represented by one or several layers filled with dots and colored in different hues. The time of occurrence of an earthquake is depicted by the central part of the ollin or eye. For earthquakes occurring during the day, the eye is open; it is shown as closed for other earthquakes occurring at night.” (Suarez and Garcia-Acosta 2021:2-3) Now any definition I can find of the word helix or helices refers to them as spirals in form and the projections from the central circle of the ollin are obviously not helices, I would describe them as projecting forms on either side, each side divided by notches into three portions for a total of six sections.

We take it as an article of faith that the cultures of the American southwest and of Mexico and Mesoamerica knew something of each other, traded with each other, and had some influences of each other’s cultures.

Petrloglyph from Glorieta Mesa, New Mexico. USDA Forest Service photograph.

I have found an image of a rock art symbol at Glorieta Mesa, New Mexico, which actually looks remarkably like this a portion of this earthquake symbol. In 2008 Larry Loendorf wrote of the Glorieta Mesa petroglyphs -“Many circles are simply concentric, but they can also be embellished by rays projecting from their outer ring. In some instances circles are divided into segments by lines radiating from the center, which make s them look like another natural form, the sand dollar. Some concentric circles have smaller, irregularly shaped ‘petals’ at intervals around the outermost ring.” (Loendorf 2008:61)

This symbol from Glorieta Mesa also has central concentric circles with six projections coming from the outer circle. Is this actually intended to be a copy of the Aztec ollin or Earth glyph? I really cannot say, but it is intriguing. It might not deserve the cigar but it is close.

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:

Loendorf, L., 2008, Thunder and Herds: Rock Art of the High Plains, Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek, California.

Suarez, Gerardo, and Virginia Garcia-Acosta, 2021, The First Written Accounts of Pre-Hispanic Earthquakes in the Americas, Seismological Research Letters, www.srl-online.org, Volume XX, No. XX

Wikipedia, Codex Telleriano-Remensis, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Telleriano-Remensis

York, Annie, Richard Daley and Chris Arnett, 1993    They Write Their Dream on the Rock Forever: Rock Writings of the Stein River Valley of British Columbia, Talonbooks, Vancouver, B.C.

FLUIDICS? - THE DOLMEN OF THE NORTH-WEST CAUCASUS AND THE BIZARRE REPORTS ABOUT CASTING STONES AND ROCK ART FROM LIQUIDS:

Dolman in Caucasus. Online photograph, public domain.

Dolman in Caucasus. Online photograph, public domain.

Burial structures known as dolmen occur through much of Eurasia, the Mediterranean, and in the Middle East as well. At their simplest they consist of three or four large rocks with a bigger cap rock on top to create a chamber, but they can be considerably more finished.

Dolman in Caucasus. Online photograph, public domain.

“In the North-West Caucasus, from Abkhazia the Taman Peninsula, are thousands of ancient dolmens which the locals call ‘ispun’, meaning the ‘houses of dwarves’. The megalithic structures were built during the early Bronze Age, from the middle of the 4^th millennium BC to the end of the 2^nd millennium BC. Dolmen construction consisted of a chamber built from several precisely dressed connected stone blocks, or were ca(r)ved in a rock mass. A large roof slab covered the chamber, whilst an access portal was formed by projecting blocks from the side walls and the overhanging roof slab. Most dolmens are punctuated with either a square, semi-circular, or oval access porthole in the centre of the façade, and can be specified into four basic types; slab, built-up, semi-monolithic and monolithic, with a typical floor plan that is square, trapezoidal, rectangular, and round.” (HeritageDaily 2021)

Dolman in Caucasus. Online photograph, public domain.

A very strange 2013 paper by Sharikov et. al. on the creation of these dolmen (see below) purports to prove that they were constructed without physical stone carving technology by casting fluids in molds that then hardened into the stone. Introduced by J. Davidovitz of his Geopolymer Institute, his application of fluidics was originally intended to prove that the blocks of stone in the pyramids of Giza in Egypt were cast, not carved from a quarry. This would be the Bronze Age equivalent of the site-cast concrete buildings of modern business parks where a wall, floor, or other component is cast horizontally on the ground out of reinforced concrete and then hoisted into place with preset, and carefully premeasured, steel components meeting upon erection to allow welding, riveting, or bolting them together to hold everything in place.

Dolman in Caucasus. Online photograph, public domain.

Dolman with carved (petroglyphic) elements on the front. Online photograph, public domain.

“There are raised patterns (petroglyphs) on the face slabs of some dolmens. To obtain such a relief, the builders would have to grind off the layer from the whole surface of the face slab. However the bas-relief is made very accurately. The stone surface is smooth and has no traces of stone working. The work on the creation of the bas-reliefs is very labor intensive and involves the use of very sophisticated stone working technology and special equipment.” (Sharikov et. al. 2013: 41) I do not understand why, if the slabs used in these constructions were cast from special fluids, why the patterns would not have just been cast in place instead of having to subsequently carve them. In other words, if you are making a mold to cast the whole wall in one piece why not modify the surface of the mold to create the pattern you want?

Carbonized tree limb found embedded in sandstone. Sharikov et al., 2013, Fig. 12, p. 43.

The team found “proof” of the fluid origin of the rock in the appearance of a  carbonized tree limb imbedded in the rock at one dolman. As this tree limb was not fully fossilized they could try to date the sample with radiocarbon. “The radiocarbon dating has been used to determine the age of carbon contained in the tree limb, which was found in the rock of the dolmen built near Pshada. This is the first attempt known to us to evaluate the time of fluidolites formation in the Caucasus. The measurements were carried out in 2010 using an accelerating mass-spectrometer (AMS) produced by the company NEC, in the Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Laboratory of the National Science Foundation of the USA, the University of Arizona (Tucson, USA). – According to the results got, the specimen of the charred wood in the rock dated back to 42,100 ± 1,500 years ago and the specimen of the tree limb in the rock dated back to 24,240 ± 190 years ago. It means that the sandstone of Pshada’s rock mass, which was used for the construction of a number of dolmens in the neighborhood, formed in the era corresponding to the upper Paleolithic age. The data are critical for further research, since they demonstrate that the rock used for the dolmens is of quite a ‘young’ geologic age – it can in no way belong to Mesozoic!” (Sharikov et. al. 2013: 43)

Dolman in Caucasus. Online photograph, public domain.

Sharikov et al go to great lengths to scientifically prove their theories that these dolmen were cast out of some fluid. They show microphotographs of polished samples of the material, and diagrams of how the earth forms were constructed and the panels were cast. What they do not do is present any evidence of an actual material analysis telling us what ingredients went into this wondrous fluid that they used to cast stone panels 42,000 to 20,000 years ago. This example of pseudoscience and its bogus conclusions do not have a place in serious discussion.

NOTE 1: An inquiry to the University of Arizona AMS Laboratory failed to clarify the claimed ages. They have been unable to find the reports cited by Sharikov et al.

NOTE 2: 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.

PRIMARY REFERENCES:

Heritage Daily, 2021, The Mysterious Dolmens of the North-West Caucuses, September 2021, https://www.heritagedaily.com

Sharikov, Ur. N., K. E. Yakobson, O. N. Komissar, Ya. V. Kusmin, and E. G. T. Jull, 2013, Investigations, Reconstruction and Geological Aspects of Dolmen Construction Technology in the North-West Caucasus, Archaeology 2013m Vol. 2, No. 2, pp. 38-46. 

SECONDARY REFERENCE:

Davidovits, Joseph, 2009-2017 (2 editions), Why the Pharaohs Built the Pyramids With Fake Stones, Geopolymer Institute, Saint-Quentin, France, ISBN: 9782951482043

MIDDLE PLEISTOCENE HOMININ HAND AND FOOT IMPRESSIONS IN TIBET:

Handprint and footprint panel from Quesang, Tibet. Internet photo.

One subject of continual interest is the age of any example of art, particularly the earliest (oldest) example of art. Previously, pieces of ocher from Blombos Cave in South Africa had been claimed as the oldest example of petroglyphs in the world. One fragment, which has been dated to ca. 100,000 years BCE, bears a pattern of intentional scratch marks on the surface. On 25 August 2018, I wrote of this “All students of this question seem to share the assumption that the ocher was ground to make a pigment powder that can be mixed into paint for other use. What the current debate seems to be about is whether the designs on the ocher have any symbolic significance or whether they were perhaps only doodles.” (Faris 2018) While they look to me to have been created by scraping to get powdered ocher, they have been accepted as human made marks, thus possibly the oldest petroglyph.

There are always going to be questions about whether certain old traces of hominin activity should be classified as art. This is particularly relevant when it comes to recently described human hand and foot prints discovered in Tibet. By the same logic applied to the Blombos cave ocher, if the Tibetan hand and foot prints had been placed intentionally, ipso facto, they must be accepted as petroglyphs. just as the mud glyphs of Tennessee caves, or as painted handprints are accepted as pictographs.

Back in 2016 and 2017 I wrote a couple of columns on handprints and pictographs in Tibet as being the highest (altitude above sea level) rock art known. The handprints were reported from a location given as Chusang, which I assume is a different spelling for the same place as this report, Quesang. They were actual handprints in travertine limestone and were dated to approximately 7,400 years BP. Now new dating of handprints at Quesang have given us much older dates. (Faris 2017)

Closeup of handprints. Internet photo.

“At Quesang on the Tibetan Plateau we report a series of hand and foot impressions that appear to have been intentionally placed on the surface of a unit of soft travertine. The travertine was deposited by water from a hot spring which is now inactive and as the travertine lithified it preserved the traces. On the basis of the sizes of the hand and foot traces we suggest that two track-makers were involved and were likely children. We interpret this event as a deliberate artistic act that created a work of parietal art. The travertine unit on which the traces were imprinted dates to between ~169 and 226 ka BP. This would make the site the earliest currently known example of parietal art in the world and would also provide the earliest evidence discovered to date for hominins on the High Tibetan Plateau (above 4000 m a.s.l.).” (Zhang et al 2021)

New demonstation panel. "Active seep/stream below current hot spring with soft travertine in which the first author (Zhang) has placed three handprints in 2019." (Zhang 2021)

This particular area on the Tibetan plateau is supplied with a number of hot springs, both active and fossilized. This particular location is one of the fossilized hot springs.

Regional context for Quesang prints showing other hominin locales.

“We argue that these traces were imprinted into soft travertine (pre-lithification) and were not carved after the travertine had lithified. On the basis of Uranium series dating the travertine unit in which the tracks are impressed dates from between ~169 and 226 ka BP. Based on the size of the tracks the trackmakers were likely two children and the traces were not imprinted during normal locomotion or by the use of hands to stabilize motion as reported at the Rocomonfina track site in Italy. Consequently, we argue that the deliberate track-making was likely and early act of parietal art.” (Zhang et al:2021)

Location of panel. "The site consists of a rocky promontory and the art-panel was exposed on the surface of one of these blocks by the natural removal of an overlying block." (Zhang et al, 2021)

Five hand prints and five footprints were recorded on the travertine unit under study. The team compared measurements of the prints to the growth curves of modern humans. “A growth curve suggests that the track-maker was of equivalent size to a Homo sapiens child with a mean age of 7.75 ± 0.12 (years). The length to width ratio of the hands falls within the modern range, although the fingers are more elongated. The average hand length is 161.07 ± 2.72 mm, which equates to a child with a mean age of 12.17 ± 0.18 a, using a modern Homo sapiens growth curve.” (Zhang et al:2021)

While you may or may not be able to think of them as art per se, they do seem to have been intentionally made, and that intentionality to modify a surface, to leave a physical trace, is at the root of all artistic creation. These prints seem to be the earliest currently known so we must consider them to be the oldest known examples of art.

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:

Faris, Peter, 2018, Oldest Petroglyphs So Far?, 25 August 2018, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Blombos%20 cave

Faris, Peter, 2017, High Altitude Rock Art – Tibet Yet Again, 30 September 2017, https://www.blogspot.com

Zhang, David D. et al, 2021, Earliest Parietal Art: Hominin Hand and Foot Traces From the Middle Pleistocene of Tibet, Science Bulletin (2021), DOI: 10.1016/j.scrib.2021.09.001

SULAWESI'S BADA VALLEY MEGALITHS:

Lore Linda megaliths, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Lore Linda megaliths, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Earlier this year I posted two columns on the rock art of the island of Sulawesi (Faris 2021), one of the islands of Indonesia. One pictograph in a cave on Sulawesi is currently the oldest dated painted zoomorph known, dated to 45,500 BCE. Less widely advertised is a large collection of megalithic stone carvings in Lore Lindu National Park, a 2,180 km² reserve in the province of Central Sulawesi. “There are over 400 granite megaliths in the area, of which about 30 represent human forms. They vary in size from a few centimeters to 4.5 meters. The original purpose of the megaliths is unknown. Other megaliths are in form of large pots (Kalamba) and stone plates (Tutu’na). Various archaeological studies have dated the carvings from between 3000 BC to 1300 AD.” (Indonesia-tourism.com)

Lore Linda megaliths, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

“Sulawesi, also known as Celebes, is one of the four Greater Sunda islands and was first inhabited during prehistory when the island almost certainly formed part of the land bridge used for the settlement of Australia and New Guinea by at least 40,000 BC. A majority of the present-day inhabitants descend from the Buginese or Bugis people, which are an ethnic group that migrated around 2000 BC to the area around Lake Tempe, and Lake Sidenreng, in the Walannae Depression in the southwest peninsula of Sulawesi.” (Heritage Daily 2021)

Lore Linda megaliths, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

 

Varying styles in the presentation of the anthropomorphs and in details of their carving attest to more than one episode of carving.

“According to an inventory conducted by megalith enthusiasts of the Sagarmatha Faculty of Agriculture in 1994, there are over 300 (over 400 are now known) megalithic sites around the Lore Lindu National Park. Objects exist in the form of statues, large pots or vats, and stone mortars. Unfortunately, many of these ancient relics have been smuggled out of the area, sold and traded.” (Rosario 2020)

As is so common to we humans many of the carvings have been given names by the people.

Palindo megalith, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Palindo megalith in 1930s with Dutch tourists, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Palindo (The Entertainer) – “This (is) the largest statue in the area standing 440 cm from the ground. It is suggested that the Palindo is related to death, because his round face and large eyes face west. According to Toraja culture, a region in south Sulawesi, west is the direction of death. This theory holds some credibility based on the fact that the Toraja and Bada people share linguistic and cultural similarities. For example, both the Bada and Taraja sacrifice a buffalo for the deceased during funeral ceremonies. Another local legend talls of an ancient King of Luwu, who in order to prove his dominance, once ordered 1,800 of his subjects to move the statue from its location in the village of Sepe to Palopo, a long way south. The efforts failed, but as an insult to the abusive king, the people turned the once south-facing statue to the west. When the king’s followers tried to turn it back, it fell to its side, where it rests till today.” (Rosario 2020)

Maturu megalith, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Maturu (Sleeper) – “Measuring 3.8 meters, Maturu looks very much like a horizontal Palindo, but with very faded features. It was referred to by explorers from the early 1900s as ‘the statue that lies on its back.’” (Rosario 2020)

Kalamba megalith, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Kalamba (Large pots) – “Just up the path from Maturu, are vast stone cisterns, which are dotted across the valley. The Kalamba may have been used as baths or burial chambers for nobles and those of high status.” (Rosario 2020)

Oba megalith, Bada Valley, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Online photograph, public domain.

Oba (Monkey) – “This small fellow sits in the midst of a paddy field. It is a small statue, just barely over 40 cm from the ground. As its name suggests, this figure has amusingly monkey-like features.” (Rosario 2020)

All in all Sulawesi presents us with a number of new chinks in the armor of the old Euro-centric colonial assumptions on the development and advancement of human culture and force a serious and comprehensive re-appraisal of the role of Southeast Asia.

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:       

Central Sulawesi, indonesia-tourism.com, accessed in September 2021.

Faris, Peter, 2021, The Effects of Climate Change on the Pleistocene Rock Art of Sulawesi, 5 June 2021, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com

Faris, Peter, 2021, A New Candidate for the Oldest Pictograph – the Sulawesi Pig, 13, February 2021, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com

Heritage Daily, 2021, The Lore Lindu Megaliths, https://www.heritagedaily.com.

Rosario, Flame, 2020, Lore Lindu & the Mystifying Megaliths of Bada Valley, https://www.cryptoanthropologist.com