Everyone knows that in order to draw a picture you need a tool, a brush, a
pencil, or a crayon. Before one can draw art on a wall, one must have a
tool like these. When do these first appear in the fossil record?
Amazingly early. Bahn writes:
"Pieces of haematite or ochre even appear to have been carried into sites
in South Africa up to 800,000 or 900,000 years ago; a small ochre pebble,
faceted and with oblique striations, which was found in an Acheulian layer
at Hunsgi, southern India, dating to between 200,000 and 300,000 years
ago, seems to have been used as a crayon on rock; a Stone Age site at
Nooitgedacht near Kimberley, South Africa has yielded a ground ochre
fragment with an estimated date of over 200,000 years ago, and pieces of
pigment have been recovered from Zimbabwean shelter deposits of more than
125,000 years ago. A piece of red mineral, with vertical striations
resulting from use, was found in the Acheulian (c. 250,000 BC) rock shelter
of Becov, Czech Republic, which
had been occupied by Homo erectus, the early human ancestor. The even
earlier site of Terra Amata (about 300,000 BC) at Nice, France, produced
seventy-five bits of pigment ranging in colour from yellow to brown, red
and purple; most of them have traces of artificial abrasion, and were
clearly introduced to the site by the occupants, since they do not occur
naturally in the vicinity."
"More specific examples of Acheulian art are appearing now that people are
becoming more receptive to the idea: a classic example of 'I would not see
it if I did not believe it'! For example, there are a number of bones and
stones from this period in Europe that bear what seem to be series or
patterns of deliberate and non-functional incisions-for example twelve
horse bones from the French rock shelter of Abri Suard (Charente); a
fragment of bovine rib from Le Pech d l'Aze (Dordogne), of c. 300,000 BC,
bearing an intentional engraving comprising a series of connected double
arcs; and several bones from Bilzingsleben (Germany), of about the same
date, likewise have series of parallel incisions which seem to have nothing
to do with cutting or working. Thee is also parietal art of this
period-two petroglyphs, a large circular cupule and a pecked meandering
line, have been found in Auditorium Cave, Bhimbetka (India), which were
covered by an Acheulian occupation level."
"However, the real breakthrough in the subject has come about recently
through analysis by American researcher Alexander Marshack of new or
hitherto neglected pieces of evidence from the Near East: in particular,
from the Acheulian site of Berekhat Ram, Israel, a small shaped piece of
volcanic tuff that dates to somewhere between 233,000 and 800,000 years
ago. The fragment bears a natural resemblance to a female figurine, and
seems to have grooves around its 'neck' and along its 'arms'. Much rested
on the question of whether these grooves were natural or humanly made; but
Marshack's microscopic analysis has now made it quite clear that humans
were responsible. In otherwords, this was an intentionally enhanced image,
and indisputably an 'art object." Paul G. Bahn, and Jean Vertut, Journey
Through the Ice Age, (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1997), p. 23- 24
The 300,000 year old site of Pech de l'Aze had 218 crayons for making art.
These were made of both manganese oxide (black/blue) and 23 of them were
red. All showed evidence of having been used in the form of abrasion and
flattened surfaces. (p. 26). What they were used on we don't know.
Even jewelry goes far back into the past.
"Where ornaments are concerned, these too exist in the Middle
Palaeolithic-for example two bones ( a wolf foot-bone and a swan vertebra),
with holes bored through the top, from Bocksteinschmiede (Germany, dating
to c. 110,000 years ago; a carved and polished segment of mammoth molar,
and a fossil nummulite with a line engraved across it (making a cross with
a natural crack), from Tata, Hungary, dating to c. 100,000 years ago; a
bone fragment from Pech de l'Aze (Dordogne), with a hole carved in it; a
reindeer phalange with a hole bored through its top, and a fox canine with
an abandoned attempt at perforation, from La Quina (Charente). Moreover,
the rich array of ornaments from the French cave of the Grotte du Renne at
Arcy-sur-Cure (Yonne)-including wolf and fox canines made into pendants by
incising a groove around the top, at least one sawn reindeer incisor, a
bone fragment with a wide carved hole, a sea-fossil with a hole bored
through its centre, and a fossil shell with a groove cut around the top-can
safely be attributed to Neanderthal craftsmanship, since they come from a
Chatelperronian layer (c. 34,000 BC) containing a Neanderthal temporal
bone." Paul G. Bahn, and Jean Vertut, Journey Through the Ice Age, (London:
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1997), p. 25
The earliest Cave art does not come from Europe but comes from Australia
but from South Australia and dates 42,000 years old. The second oldest
cave art also comes from Australia and is 39,000 years old. This consists
of a fragment of painted cave wall which was buried in sediments of that
age. Since the sediments were younger than the fragment, this represents a
minimum age for the art. (p. 35)
His frustration with those who misrepresent the actual data of the art
record shows.
"It is often pointed out by those who still cling to the belief that 'art'
was first invented by anatomically modern humans (amazingly, some even
continue to point to Europe or even the Dordogne as its birthplace!) that
the specimens claimed for earlier periods are very few in number and highly
disparate. However, the reasons why there is so little solid evidence for
'art' before the Upper Palaeolithic are simple. First, it has been a
longstanding dogma among archaeologists and anthropologists alike that no
such thing could exist before the Aurignacian-earlier occurrences were
simply dismissed as utilitarian marks, contaminatin from later levels,
copying from or imports from Aurignacian neighbours (in the case of
Chatelperronian beads), or freak one-offs (such as the La Ferrassie
cupmarks)-with the result that many examples in the archaeological record
have probably been missed or ignored.
"Second, there is the role of taphonomy: 'the severity of taphonomic
distorition of archaeological evidence increases with its age', in other
words, we should expect much less evidence of artistic activity to have
survived from the Middle Palaeolithic than from the Upper, and far less
again from the Lower. The earliest abundance of any form of archaeological
evidence (especialoly of perishable kinds, such as the much-touted beads
and shells of the Early Upper Palaeolithic) should never be interpreted
automatically as the earliest occurrence of a phenomenon." Paul G. Bahn,
and Jean Vertut, Journey Through the Ice Age, (London: Weidenfeld &
Nicolson, 1997), p. 26
Christians who continue to cling to the myth that art is only 40,000 years
old also ignore the abundant evidence that humanity is much, much older.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
Lots of information on creation/evolution