Researchers have discovered what they believe to be the oldest painting featuring humans in the world.
The scene was discovered in a cave on a remote island 1,200km north of Australia, and it depicts a rather odd situation. Despite the painting being in poor quality, the researchers who found it believe that it is an image of humans interacting with a very large pig.
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The image, which was uncovered on the island of Sulawesi, now home to a tropical Indonesian village, can be dated back as far as 51,000 years thanks to new technology which is able to precisely date rocks and the carbonate layers of art.
Professor Adam Bumm, part of the team that discovered this incredible artwork, spoke to the media, saying: “[Pigs] were clearly economically important to these early people... symbolically and perhaps even spiritually.”
He said it is impossible to tell at the moment whether the painting depicts people worshipping the pig or hunting it, since the culture that spawned the image is long lost.
The new technology for dating art was invented by experts at Griffith and Southern Cross universities. One of these experts, Professor Aubert, said: “Our new LA-U-series technique is more accurate, allowing us to date the earliest calcium carbonate layers formed on the art and get closer to the point in time the art was created. It will revolutionize rock art dating.”
However, he added that just because they will be able to date ancient art more easily, there will still be many obstacles to finding the art itself, since much of it is hidden or in very remote areas.
According to researchers, the cave artwork in Indonesia is similar to the cave artwork in Europe in that it abruptly stopped around 12,000 to 14,000 years ago. They are no closer to finding out why this culture seemed to vanish around the world, but with this new technology they hope to uncover even more ancient artwork and perhaps some answers to their historical questions.
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