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Faces from the Ice Age

Posted by timothy on from the shocking-discoveries dept.

Photoshop B.C. Edition writes: "Talk about data mining. Apparently some of those ice age cave paintings found throughout France actually may have, or had, some human portraits engraved, not on their walls, but on their floors. The controversial discovery was made at the Lascaux cave complex whose paintings date back around 15,000 years ago. This may explain why all the previous examples of cave paintings never depicted realistic representations of humans, while at the same time successfully representing realistic looking animals. (By the way, the one at the bottom of the article looks like Darth Maul ;)"

12 comments

  1. i believe this outdates previous records by JPawloski · · Score: 0

    IIRC, wasn't the last ice-age era engraving found in Russia within a few thousand years of the ones they are reporting there?

    In any case, interesting stuff, although it shouldn't be much of a surprise to anyone that we would come across something like this -- the better question is WHEN we will come across more of it (and where).

    1. Re:i believe this outdates previous records by ParticleGirl · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's not about when we come across it. It's about when they were capable of it. That early, people were not "people" as they are today. When did they have the physiological capability and the tools to draw? When did they have a sense of the symbolic and representational enough to draw people? What are the implications of drawing people at all, when previously the cave paintings weren't thought to contain any detailed pictures of people, merely of animals? Further, were the people they were drawing real (ie, a friend or family member or...) and if not, what are the implications of drawing imaginary people?

      It seems that capacity for symbolic representation began in the Upper Paleolithic. That's before 15,000 years ago, but just around 30,000 years ago (the dates in the article.) The earlier and more complex the art that we find, the more we learn about long-gone cognitive processes that preceeded our own.

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    2. Re:i believe this outdates previous records by Ashurbanipal · · Score: 4, Interesting
      That early, people were not "people" as they are today.
      Depending on how you meant that, it's either very obvious or it's a good example of the tendency to dehumanize other races and tribes. Would you care to elaborate?
      It seems that capacity for symbolic representation began in the Upper Paleolithic
      Unless the archeological record is incomplete. I think it's just as likely that earlier art did not survive - there has to be some upper limit to the shelf life of prehistoric art, so maybe that's the barrier we've found and it has nothing to do with hominid capacities at all.

      I think you need a time machine to know for sure, but I'd like to hear the basis of your dating anyway!

    3. Re:i believe this outdates previous records by ParticleGirl · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Well, to some extent, I pulled it out of my ass. To a different extent, my ass is particularly qualified: I'm on my way to a PhD in archaeology. I believe there is a geologic table in Merriam Webster that has dates of these periods, but I"m not positive. Regardless, I know when the boundary between the Middle and Upper Paleolithic are, and I know what the currently accepted (though, as always, subject to revision) theory as to the evolution of homo sapiens sapiens is.

      By "not 'people' as they are today" I mean that, prior to the Upper Paleolithic, there was very little differentiating our ancestral hominids from other (modern or ancient) nonhuman primates. They could make tools more specified, but still were barely capable of more than a modern chimp using an anvil to crack a nut or a twig to "fish" for termites. There has been no indication of any ability to think symbolically.

      Toward the end of the Middle Paleolithic (about 35,000 to 40,000 years ago) we begin to see three very important things: 1. displacement of materials over very large distances, 2. intentional human burials, and 3. evidence of collective planning and coordinating, especially in regards to hunting meat. Materials being displaced over large areas that share no boundaries indicates a capacity for symbolic displacement, or the first necessity for language. Perhaps some sort of protolanguage arose during this time. Intentional burials are the first evidence we have for any sort of symbolic act. These things all indicate the very beginnings of symbolic thought. You must admit that, since we're talking about the very beginnings of symbolic thought (and that we, currently, are capable of language and symbolic thought far beyond this level) it's only appropriate to remind everyone here that these are not "people" we're talking about as we are people today.

      So, with the capacity for symbolic thought emerging 40,000 to 35,000 years ago, the appearance of something so complex as a representation of a human face at 30,000 years ago would tell us a lot. For quite a few thousand years after that point, all we currently have are uniform-looking fertility figures and stick-figures hunting elaborate animals painted on walls (yes, the limits of what we've found in the archaeological record.) Regardless, somewhere on the border between Middle and Upper Paleolithic (and where do you think these borders come from?) something changed dramatically in hominids' perceptions of the world. They gained capacity for symbolic thought-- they perhaps became capable of drawing a face and recognizing a drawing. Additionally, it is just at this time (beginning of the Upper Paleolithic) that Neanderthals go extinct, and that our own forerunners are left to dominate the hominid line. (Before this extinction, technology and art and symbolic things like burials were associated with neanderthals as well-- not just our own ancestors.)

      What I got out of the article is that caves with paintings of animals in them date back nearly as far as the end of the Middle Paleolithic and beginning of the Upper. Given the faces on the floor of one of these caves, it is possible that there are others in the other caves mentioned-- the ones that date back 30,000 years. Given that possibility, we could learn quite a lot about the development of early hominids.

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    4. Re:i believe this outdates previous records by Ashurbanipal · · Score: 3, Interesting
      Perhaps some sort of protolanguage arose during this time. Intentional burials are the first evidence we have for any sort of symbolic act. These things all indicate the very beginnings of symbolic thought.
      I'd say symbolic thought probably precedes the activity that makes it distinguishable (archeologically) by millenia. For example, gorillas and whales are believed to be able to grasp fairly abstract concepts, definitely including symbolic representation in the case of gorillas. Perhaps symbolic representation 60,000 years ago was ritually restricted to song cycles (not necessarily language-songs like Australian dreamwalk songs, but symbolic sounds like whalesong). Guesswork of this sort is fun, the paucity of the archeological record is what makes it interesting.
      You must admit that, since we're talking about the very beginnings of symbolic thought (and that we, currently, are capable of language and symbolic thought far beyond this level) it's only appropriate to remind everyone here that these are not "people" we're talking about as we are people today.
      I see your point although I don't really agree with it; I think proto-hominids were people in all the ways that I personally measure people today. That's not to say I don't realize they were different people (just like Bushmen are different from Boers) but rather that I'd have phrased the observation a bit differently myself. Thank you for amplifying your comments, it was very gracious of you.
  2. Here you go.. by dostick · · Score: 2, Funny

    ..the proof that Star Wars happened before the life on Earth was born.

  3. Hmm by daeley · · Score: 3, Funny

    What could be the oldest lifelike drawings of human faces have been uncovered in a cave in southern France....Now, one German scientist, Dr Michael Rappenglueck, of Munich University, says it is time the pictures were reassessed.

    Vee have vays of making you chalk.

    ;)

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    I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
  4. Prehistoric porno! by Phexro · · Score: 2

    Megaceros Gallery Panel of vulvas, the earliest TGP known to man.

  5. Duh by quantaman · · Score: 2

    (By the way, the one at the bottom of the article looks like Darth Maul ;)"

    Hello? True it was a long time ago but but what part of a galaxy far far away did you miss?! You have to check you facts before making a statement like that, this is how rumours get started!

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    I stole this Sig
    1. Re:Duh by doooras · · Score: 2

      Well, the people ARE called Humans, and they DO speak English, so maybe when the Empire fell, some of them came to Earth to start a new life.

      they must not have had the common "leaking hyperdrive" problem, though if they made it this far.

  6. Also interesting by Lars+T. · · Score: 2

    "On the floors of one cave I noticed a series of pits arranged in the shape of the Pleiades (also known as the Seven Sisters) star cluster," he said.

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    Lars T.

    To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck

  7. And in breaking news... by surfcow · · Score: 2

    The FBI's new face recognition technology has identified one of these images as that of John Ashcroft. Which could explain a lot.

    =brian