Stone Pages - Archaeo News (France)

Striking 'earth mother' figurine discovered in France

Sun, 11 Dec 2011 12:09:42 +0100

Striking 'earth mother' figurine discovered in France

French archaeologists have discovered an extremely rare example of a Neolithic 'earth mother' figurine on the banks of the river Somme. The 6,000-year-old statuette is 8in (20cm) high, with imposing buttocks and hips but stubby arms and a cone-like head. Similar figures have been found before in Europe but rarely so far north and seldom in such a complete and well-preserved condition.
The 'lady of Villers-Carbonnel', as she has been named, can make two claims to be an 'earth mother'. She was fired from local earth or clay and closely resembles figurines with similar, stylised female bodies found around the Mediterranean. Although Neolithic experts are revising their opinions, the figures have long believed to have been connected with the existence of a cult which worshipped a goddess of fertility.
The Somme figurine may owe her survival, paradoxically, to the fact that she was broken while being made, between 4300 and 3600 BCE. Her various pieces were discovered in a collapsed Neolithic kiln or oven at an archaeological dig near Villers-Carbonnel on the banks of the river Somme in the region of the same name.
The figurine may be just the beginning of a vast archaeological harvest in Northern France in the next few years. The French government's 'preventive archaeology' agency, Inrap, has been given permission and the funds to explore 77 sites along the 60-mile course of the new 50m-wide Seine-Nord Europe canal for ocean-going barges linking the river Seine to Belgium and the Rhine.
"The statuette is very beautiful and remarkably preserved. We sometimes find fragments of such statuettes but rarely the whole figure," the archaeologist in charge of the Villers-Carbonnel dig, Françoise Bostyn, said. Ms Bostyn added that the stylised figure closely resembled similar figures from the period found as far away as the Middle East.

Edited from The Independent (10 December 2011)

Prehistoric cave paintings of horses were spot-on

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 16:01:10 +0100

Long thought by many as possible abstract or symbolic expressions as opposed to representations of real animals, the famous palaeolithic horse paintings found in caves such as Lascaux and Chauvet in France likely reflect what the prehistoric humans actually saw in their natural environment, suggest researchers who conducted a recent DNA study.
An international team of researchers genotyped and analysed nine coat-color types in 31 wild horses dating as far back as 35,000 years ago from bone specimens in 15 different locations that included Siberia, Eastern and Western Europe, and the Iberian Peninsula.
They found that all colour schemes for horses seen in Palaeolithic cave paintings, including the distinctive 'leopard' spotting actually existed in ancient pre-domestic horse populations, supporting the theory that the cave artists were reflecting what they actually saw. Four Pleistocene and two Copper Age bone samples showed genetic evidence of the leopard spotting, and bone samples from 18 other horses showed evidence of bay and black, bay being the most common colour for horses depicted in the cave paintings.
Said team researcher Professor Michi Hofreiter of the Department of Biology at the University of York, UK: "While previous DNA studies have produced evidence for bay and black horses, our study has demonstrated that the leopard complex spotting phenotype was also already present in ancient horses and was accurately depicted by their human contemporaries nearly 25,000 years ago. Our findings lend support to hypotheses that argue that cave paintings constitute reflections of the natural environment of humans at the time and may contain less of a symbolic or transcendental connotation than often assumed."

Edited from Popular Archaeology, Science Now (7 November 2011)

Art hints prehistoric men pierced their privates

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 11:27:45 +0100

Paleolithic phallic art suggests that many early European men scarred, pierced and tattooed their penises. The practice appears to have been most common in France and Spain around 12,000 years ago. The meaning of the symbols remains a mystery, but many match images found on cave art from the same period.
Analysis of phallic decorations in Paleolithic art, described in the December issue of The Journal of Urology, may also show evidence of the world's first known surgery performed on a male genital organ. The alteration, or surgery, might have just been for ornamental purposes, or a piercing, the researchers suggest.
Lead author Javier Angulo, chair of the Department of Urology at Hospital Universitario de Getafe in Spain, explains that, like today, tattooing and manipulation of body parts have always functioned as a way for people to express themselves. "[People] may feel that scars are a written story on the skin," he said. "The face and areas around natural orifices are parts of the body with a higher tendency to be decorated and shown."
Angulo and colleagues Marcos García-Díez and Marc Martínez studied male genital representations in portable, mostly handheld sizes of art made in Europe approximately 38,000 to 11,000 years ago. The pieces, researchers say, frequently mirrored what actually appeared on the male penis. "Modern primitives did modify their bodies, including their genitals, with the use of tattooing, perforations and cuttings (scars) to change their appearance," Angulo said. They therefore believe it is "highly probable that the marks left on these phalli are not decorative for the sake of the piece of art but rather a depiction of real-life details."
Many of the marks are geometric shapes, such as triangles or circles. Some designs appear to match those of figures seen within Paleolithic cave art from the same regions. This suggests that the symbols may have held important meanings for people then. Angulo added that possible explanations for the symbols include: "territorial signs or landmarks, shamanistic repetitive marks in the passage to an unconscious world, some forms of primitive counting, the investigation of non-figurative artistic expression playing with spaces and light and darkness... Who knows?"
What is clear is that phallic decoration became more prevalent among men of the Magdalenian Culture in France and Spain about 12,000 years ago. Another finding of the study is that prehistoric men seemed to favor preputial retraction. As a result, the scientists think it's likely that early males practiced circumcision. To this day, ritual or religious circumcisions occur within several cultures.
For the prehistoric cultures, Angulo believes that their 'canon of beauty' changed over time. Earlier humans of the Gravettian culture appear to have favored more exaggerated depictions of sexuality, as is evident in many of their 'Venus' figurines of naked women. The Magdalenians, on the other hand, had a more naturalistic concept of beauty, according to the authors.

Edited from Discovery News (11 November 2011)

Children learned to finger-paint in Palaeolithic Age

Tue, 04 Oct 2011 11:44:47 +0100

Stone age toddlers may have attended a form of prehistoric nursery where they were encouraged to develop their creative skills in cave art, say archaeologists. Research indicates young children expressed themselves in an ancient form of finger-painting.
Archaeologists at one of the most famous prehistoric decorated caves in France, the complex of caverns at Rouffignac in the Dordogne known as the Cave of a Hundred Mammoths, have discovered that children were actively helped to express themselves through finger fluting - running fingers over soft red clay to produce decorative crisscrossing lines, zig-zags and swirls. The stunning drawings, including 158 depictions of mammoths, 28 bisons, 15 horses, 12 goats, 10 woolly rhinoceroses, four human figures and one bear, form just a small proportion of the art found within the five-mile cave system.
The presence of children's art was first revealed in 2006 by archaeologists Leslie Van Gelder, of Walden University (USA) and her husband Kevin Sharpe. The majority of the drawings are flutings covering the walls and roofs of the many galleries and passages in the complex. One chamber is so rich in flutings by children it is believed to be an area set aside for them. The marks of four children, estimated to be aged between two and seven, have been identified there.
"It suggests it was a special place for children. Adults were there, but the vast majority of artwork is by children," said Jess Cooney, a PhD student at the university's archaeology department. "I think in this particular chamber children were encouraged to make more art than adults. It could have been a playroom where the children gathered or a room for practice where they were encouraged to make these marks in order that they could grow into artists and make the beautiful paintings and engravings we find throughout the cave. Or it could have been a room used for a ritual for particular children, perhaps an initiation of sorts."
Flutings thought to be by a five-year-old girl are the most prolific throughout the cave system. Work by four adults has also been identified, though it is possible there were two further adults present. The juxtaposition of the flutings of individuals indicate the relationships between the cave dwellers, the researchers say. For example, the markings show that one seven-year-old girl was most often in the company of the smallest of the adults, probably a male and possibly an older brother. "Some of the children's flutings are high up on walls and on the ceilings, so they must have been held up to make them or have been sitting on someone's shoulders," said Cooney. Flutings by the two-year-old suggest the child's hand was guided by an adult. "The art shows us this is not an activity where children were running amok. It shows collaboration between children and adults, and adults encouraging children to make these marks. This was a communal activity," Cooney added.
The significance of finger flutings, also found in other caves in France, Spain, New Guinea and Australia, has been widely debated in archaeological circles. Some regard the marks as doodlings, prehistoric graffiti, while others suggest rituals. Cooney said the object of her research was "to allow prehistoric children to have a voice", because so much archaeological study focused on men's activities. "What I found in Rouffignac is that the children are screaming from the walls to be heard. Their presence is everywhere. And there is a five-year-old girl constantly shouting: 'I wanna paint, I wanna paint'."

Edited from The Guardian (30 September 2011)

9000-year-old multiple burial uncovered in Corsica

Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:15:37 +0100

The exceptional discovery of burials about 9,000 years old - probably containing the oldest human remains ever found in Corsica (France) - will allow a better understanding of the history of early settlement of the island and of the Mediterranean.
On a hill near the village of Sollacaro, Southern Corsica, nestled under a huge ball-shaped block of eroded granite which served as a shelter for prehistoric peoples, the location has been excavated by a team of archaeologists from several French universities, assisted by a Danish colleague.
"It is evidence of human presence on the island during the Mesolithic period (from 10,000 to 5000 BCE)," said Joseph Cesari, regional curator of archaeological and historic monuments, in presenting the discovery this week. Having uncovered the bones of four or five adults, a teenager, and a baby spread over an area of a few square meters on the site of Campo Stefano during the past several months, efforts in recent weeks have revealed the almost complete skeleton of another adult.
Patrice Courtaud - palaeontologist and researcher at CNRS and a specialist in Bordeaux Mesolithic burial practices, said, "...there are very few multiple burials, particularly in Corsica", adding that, "We still know little about the people of the Mesolithic, a period marking the beginning of agricultural settlement". If researchers can extract DNA from bones, this will "help to further our knowledge of genetics, nutrition and lifestyle in general," says Courtaud.
Evidence of human life in Corsica during the Mesolithic had already been uncovered, including the discovery in 1973 of the 'Lady of Bonifacio'. The entire skeleton of this woman is now exhibited at the Museum Levie (Southern Corsica). The date of her burial is estimated at 6500 BCE. Another individual burial was discovered in the Cap Corse.
The first bones removed at Campo Stefano - well preserved despite the high acidity of granitic soils - can be carbon-dated to a period from 7400-6800 BCE. The remains will be the subject of extensive studies in various laboratories, including the University of Bordeaux - and may eventually be displayed at the Museum of Prehistoric Sartene, in Southern Corsica.

Edited from L'Express.fr, Le Figaro (17 September 2011)

170,000-years-old skull unearthed in France

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 22:50:37 +0100

A fraction of a prehistoric skull, which is believed to be 170,000 years old, has been unearthed in a cave in the eastern suburbs of the French town of Nice. Students Ludovic Dolez and Sebastian Lepvraud were working on the excavation site, Cave of Le Lazaret, on 13th August, when they came across the partial remains of a forehead belonging to a Homo Erectus. "It belonged to a nomad hunter, less than 25 years old. He may be able to teach us more about the evolution of his successor, the Neanderthal man," Riviera Times quoted Paleontologist Marie-Antoinette de Lumley, who has been in charge of excavation at Lazaret since 1961, as saying. The bone was left to dry for a few days where it was discovered, before being removed for a special public announcement attended by Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi.
Archaeologists have been searching this site patiently for 50 years, unveiling more than 20,000 bone fragments from prehistoric animals. Occupation layers of the cave in use during marine isotopic stage 6 (186,000-127,000 years ago) were excavated during the 1970s and may demonstrate construction abilities and other organisational skills by the inhabitants at the time.

Edited from The Hindu (28 August 2011)

Neanderthals were simply outnumbered

Sun, 31 Jul 2011 12:38:43 +0100

The Neanderthals of southwestern Europe may have gone extinct approximately 40,000 years ago because, in large measure, they were simply overwhelmed by the rising numbers of modern humans around them. It is an old and simple hypothesis that, until now, had not been backed up with an extensive statistical evidence.
The study involved analysing the density of Neanderthal and early modern human artefacts and occupation sites across the Dordogne region in southwestern France, an area well-known for the highest concentrations of Middle Palaeolithic (300,000 to 30,000 years BCE) to Upper Palaeolithic (50,000 to 10,000 years BCE) periods of human occupation.
Focusing on the transition period of 55,000 to 35,000 BCE, researchers analysed evidence of three successive distinct stone tool industries: the Mousterian-of-Acheulian (55,000 to 44,000 BCE) and Chátelperronian (44,400 to 40,250 BCE) - generally associated with the Neanderthals - and the Aurignacian (40,250 to 35,000 BCE), largely identified as that of the modern humans. The study also included an examination and analysis of the animal food remains at the sites.
The evaluation suggests an increase in overall population densities across the transition by a factor of about 9 to 10, in favour of the modern human.
Faced with this kind of competition, the Neanderthals seem to have retreated initially into more marginal and less attractive regions of the continent and eventually - within a space of at most a few thousand years - declined to extinction.

Edited from Popular Archaeology (26 July 2011), EurekAlert! (28 July 2011)

Knocked down menhirs discovered in France

Tue, 28 Jun 2011 20:13:45 +0100

Archaeologists working at the site of 'Basses Coutures', Champagne-sur-Oise (north of Paris), France, have uncovered a Iron Age settlement and two menhirs pushed over into a pit, probably dating to the Neolithic period.
These menhirs are the first discovered in the Ile-de-France in a preventative archaeology context. The first is made of an ochre-coloured Stampien sandstone. It is 2m long and 70cm wide, and has traces of pecking and 'roughening' on the visible surface, and stigmata of cutting on its edge. The second block, with similar dimensions, is made from a light grey limestone. Small blocks of limestone could represent the fragments of a third orthostat. The probable anchoring pit of a menhir is found in the centre. These menhirs were clearly knocked down.
The pottery fragments found in the main pit have a Protohistoric appearance but no clear diagnostic characteristics, and thus give no information on the period when the blocks were knocked down. However, at Belz, near Carnac, an INRAP (Institut National de Recherches Archéologiques) team recently excavated several menhirs that were knocked down and moved, or that display numerous traces of cutting. These megaliths, erected between the 5th and 6th millennia BCE, were knocked down in the Late Neolithic.
This is not the first such dismantling of megaliths in the Neolithic. The large menhirs of Locmariaquer in Brittany, dated to the 5th millennium BCE, were broken and reused in dolmens, such as that of Gavrinis.

Edited from INRAP (19 May 2011), Past Horizons (25 June 2011)

Early French had a taste for beer

Tue, 28 Jun 2011 20:11:17 +0100

Archaeologists have uncovered evidence that the occupants of southeastern France were brewing beer during the Iron Age, some 2,500 years ago.
Beer brewing's heritage stretches back to the Bronze Age in China and the Middle East, but this is the earliest sign of the practice in France, where wine-making had already taken hold. The recent find was in Roquepertuse, close to modern Aix-en-Provence, and was excavated in the 1990s.
Archaeologist Laurent Bouby from France's National Centre for Scientific Research has been studying archaeo-botany - preserved plant remains - in the region around Roquepertuse for more than a decade. Dr Bouby and his colleagues have now analysed the macro-botanical remains found at three sites during those digs.
Ninety percent of the barley grains that were recovered from these locations had been induced to sprout. The malted grains and the arrangement of the finds lead the team to surmise a "home-brew" scenario, which requires no specialised equipment.
"All that is needed is an amount of grain, some water, containers (commonly pottery vessels) in which to soak the grain, a flat paved area - possibly the floor - to spread out and turn the grain during germination, an oven to dry it in order to stop germination, domestic grindstones to grind the malted grain, and containers for fermentation and storage," they wrote.
Prior studies suggest that a variant of the barley plant known as six-row barley was the primary cultivated plant in the region at the time; the authors of the study now suggest that beer production may have been one of the principal reasons for this.

Edited from Physorg.com (14 June 2011), BBC News (15 June 2011)

No fresh milk for Neolithic humans in France

Thu, 02 Jun 2011 07:56:31 +0100

Excavation of a southern French burial site from about 3,000 BCE shows that the modern humans who expanded into the area from the Mediterranean lived in patrilocal communities (where couples live in the man's settlement), and did not have the genetic mutation that allowed later Europeans to digest fresh milk.
Scientists analysed DNA extracted from the bones of 53 people buried in Cave 1 of the Treilles, located in the Grands Causses region at Saint-Jean-et-Saint-Paul, Aveyron (south of the Viaduc de Milau) in France. They were able to get useful information from 29 of those samples; 22 men, 2 women and 5 for whom it was impossible to determine sex. Most appeared to be closely related, with two having a 99.9979% probability of being father and son and two others having a 99.9985% probability of being siblings.
Researchers deduce that the peoples in this region of France were of a genetic type more closely related to Basque and Spanish populations than current western European populations. They were also more closely related to peoples in Cyprus, Portugal, Turkey, Italy and Lebanon. None carried the gene for lactase persistence that is believed to have first evolved around 5,500 BCE in central Europe, and which allowed humans to drink fresh milk after they are weaned.
The absence of the genetic variation probably shows that the Treilles people came from agricultural-pastoral Mediterranean cultures that drank fermented milk, and had an economy based on sheep and goat farming.

Edited from PNAS (2 May 2011), Science Fair (31 May 2011)

Reindeer teeth hold clues to Neanderthal hunting tactics

Thu, 19 May 2011 10:23:07 +0100

Analysis of subtle chemical variations in reindeer teeth suggest the Neanderthal employed sophisticated hunting strategies similar to the tactics used much later by modern humans. Kate Britton, an archaeologist now at the University of Aberdeen, and her colleagues wanted to find out more about adult reindeer remains from a 70,000 year old layer at the Jonzac Neanderthal hunting camp site in France - a rock shelter believed to have been used over a long period of time - by looking at the teeth and their chemical composition.
Teeth are made of calcium, phosphorus, oxygen, strontium and other elements, but not all the atoms of each element are the same. Some atoms, or isotopes, are heavier than others and may have slightly different chemical properties. Says Britton, "Strontium in your bones and teeth is related to the food and water you consume... to the underlying soil and rocks of a particular area." It's possible to look at the strontium isotopes and find out if the animals ate and drank always in the same area, or if they moved around.
The reindeer have similar strontium isotope patterns, suggesting they moved from one area to another and back again while their teeth were developing. "The reindeer were probably travelling through the area during their annual migrations," Britton says. The Neanderthal were probably aware of the reindeer migration patterns and planned their stays to make the most out of the moving herd. "This sophisticated hunting behaviour is something we see much later in the Upper Palaeolithic amongst modern human groups, and it's really fascinating to see that Neanderthals were employing similar strategies," concludes Britton.

Edited from PhysOrg.com (16 May 2011)

Prehistoric humans and cave bears may have competed for shelter

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 20:13:07 +0100

Research shows cave bears lived in the same spaces coveted by prehistoric humans up to 32,000 years ago. The new study on cave bears, which has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Archaeological Science, may also shed light on the age of cave art depicting these enormous animals and why the bears eventually went extinct.
From 32,000 to 30,000 years ago, both humans and cave bears lived in two French caves, creating a likely man-versus-bear battle. "Paleolithic humans used to kill large animals during their hunts, so they were able to kill cave bears," lead author Celine Bon said. While genetics show cave bears consumed a mostly vegetarian diet, "they might have been violent if they were disturbed during hibernation or if they felt frightened," added Bon, a researcher in the Institute of Biology and Technology at Saclay, France.
For the study, Bon and her colleagues performed radiocarbon dating, mitochondrial DNA analysis and isotope investigations of cave bear remains from Chauvet-Pont d'Arc and Deux-Ouvertures caves located along the Ardeche River in France. Both caves feature art on the walls, some of which shows cave bears. The tests revealed that cave bears inhabited the Ardeche region from around 37,000 to 27,400 years ago, with the oldest samples from Chauvet dating to 29,000 years ago.
The DNA analysis determined the cave bear population was small and isolated, and that the bears probably died out not long after humans first began to use the natural shelters. "The cave bear population began to decline at the same time that modern humans arrived in Europe," Bon said. "Yet it is unclear if humans are responsible for the cave bear extinction because of competition over space or food resources, or if the extinction of cave bears is due to climatic and/or environmental changes. Our data favor both explanations because they show a small cave bear population size in caves occupied by humans."
Bon thinks it's doubtful the bears and humans ever lived together simultaneously in the caves. Despite the probable competition, there appears to have been a period where the bears occupied the caves during the winter while the humans took over the caves in the summer. There also might have been intervals lasting several years between cave occupations by either group.
Since the oldest cave bear remains from the Chauvet cave date to 29,000 years ago, that supports prior claims that the charcoal drawings there are the oldest in the world. The authors explain: "Because painting an animal that is no longer present is hardly feasible, we propose that these red rock art pictures are indeed very ancient, dating back to the Aurignacian (a period lasting from 40,000 to 28,000 years ago)."
Archaeologist Jean-Michel Geneste, who is director of France's National Center for Prehistory, said the "results are important for the interpretation of the Aurignacian paintings." Andrew Lawson, an archaeologist based in Salisbury, U.K., also supports the new findings. But Paul Pettitt of the University of Sheffield is skeptical that the Chauvet paintings are so ancient. He believes their style is too advanced for the date given and further questions if the bears in the drawings are cave bears or brown bears. Bon and her colleagues call for analysis of charcoal fragments spotted in the Chauvet cave places containing the cave bear remains.

Edited from Discovery News (26 April 2011)

Bear DNA clue to age of Chauvet cave art

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 10:53:18 +0100

Exploring a gorge in south-east France in 1994 for prehistoric artefacts, Jean-Marie Chauvet, squeezing through a narrow passage, found himself in a hidden cavern, the walls of which were covered with paintings of animals - beautiful images, which feature in Werner Herzog's recent documentary film, 'Cave of Forgotten Dreams'.
Radiocarbon dating suggested the images were between 30,000 and 32,000 years old, making them almost twice the age of the famous Lascaux cave art in south-west France.
Despite a comprehensive radiocarbon study published in 2001 that seemed to confirm that the paintings were indeed 30,000 years old, Paul Pettitt of the University of Sheffield, UK, and his colleagues were unconvinced.
To try to settle the controversy, Jean-Marc Elalouf of the Institute of Biology and Technology in Saclay, France, and his team have turned to the remains of cave bears. His team collected 38 samples of cave bear remains in the Chauvet cave. Radiocarbon dating showed the samples were all between 37,000 and 29,000 years old, hinting that by the end of that period they were extinct, at least locally. Samples from a nearby cave gave similar results.
"It is clear that the paintings are very ancient", says Elalouf. Pettitt remains unconvinced.

Edited from NewScientist (19 April 2011)

Neanderthals: copycats or innovators?

Tue, 08 Mar 2011 19:45:53 +0100

The question of whether Neanderthals had the ability to innovate new kinds of tools, and not just imitate, is coming up in scientific circles. For the past few decades, most archeologists assumed that Neanderthal stone tools were simple and roughly shaped. But that assumption may be undermined by the discovery at some Neanderthal sites of thinner, more blade-like stones similar to tools favored by humans during the same time period, leading some experts to assume that Neanderthals were heavily influenced by human culture.
Now, some archaeologists are viewing Neanderthals in a more favorable light, casting them as an intellectual match for humans and calling into question the widely-held idea that changes in Neanderthal culture were introduced by Homo sapiens.
The first of the recent studies was set in southern Italy, where researchers examined a group of artifacts known as the Uluzzian culture from about 30,000 years ago. At the time, Neanderthals were making their last stand in Europe, and the climate was seesawing between cold snaps and warmer periods. In such harsh and varying climates, the tools that Neanderthals traditionally used may not have been as useful, forcing them to improvise.
A central question forsaid Julien Riel-Salvatore, lead author of the study, was whether or not the Uluzzian style could have developed independently of modern humans, who were creating similar technologies to the north. The Uluzzian area, was highly isolated, so the toolkit could have developed independently of human influence. The findings indicate that even though Neanderthals eventually died off, it's possible that they attempted to adapt to their changing ecosystem.
The other new Neanderthal study was conducted by the archaeologist Thomas Higham of Oxford University. His research was focused at the Grotte du Renne, a site in France that archeologists have excavated since the 1930s. Researchers there have been exploring a similar tool grouping, from around the same time period as the Uluzzian, known as the Chatelperronian culture. The set of tools was ascribed to Neanderthals, because Neanderthal remains were found there. The combination of bones and tools proved to be a convincing argument, until Higham's paper showed definitively that the site at Grotte du Renne was disturbed long after its initial use. Because of this disturbance, it calls into question whether Neanderthals were even around when the inhabitants at the Grotte du Renne were making Chatelperronian tools.
Higham's paper casted doubt on the idea that Neanderthals created the Uluzzian culture. Riel-Salvatore agreed with Higham that it was still too early to rule out Neanderthal toolmakers at either Chatelperronian or Uluzzian sites, and that more research into the subject was needed.
Further muddying the issue is the fact that no one is certain whether the new, sharper tools were really more effective in coping with the cooling climate than Neanderthal tools. The blunt tools favored by Neanderthals were more clumsy-looking than the bladed stone tools their human contemporaries used, but were produced more efficiently and lasted longer. If Neanderthals did not develop new tools, it may not have been because they were insufficiently intelligent, but because they were already smart enough to know they didn't need the cool new tools that the humans used.

Edited from ScienceLine (7 March 2011)

3D movie portrays the rock art of the Chauvet Cave

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 16:55:26 +0100

Werner Herzog's new film 'Cave of Forgotten Dreams' is a stunning 3D documentary about a cave in France that is home to the world's oldest known human art. The legendary German director's most recent work features in the official program of the 2011 Berlin International Film Festival and his documentary portrays the Chauvet Cave in southern France.
The cave, discovered in 1994, is home to hundreds of pristine artworks. Over 30,000 years old, they are the oldest known pictures created by humans and show at least 13 different species of animals, including horses, cattle, lions and bears. In the spring of 2010, Herzog was given a unique opportunity to film inside the cave. He and his team were only allowed access for a period of a few days, and were only able to use battery-powered equipment. High levels of radon gas and carbon dioxide in the cave meant they could only stay inside for a few hours at a time.
"You have to realize that, about 20,000 years ago, there was a cataclysmic event when an entire rock face collapsed and sealed off the cave. It's a completely preserved time capsule. You've got tracks of cave bears that look like they were left yesterday, and you've got the footprint of a boy who was probably eight years old next to the footprint of a wolf. Visitors can't step on anything, so you can only move around on a two foot wide metal walkway," said Werner Herzog.
"Everything is so fresh that you have the sensation that the painters have merely retreated deeper into the dark and that they are looking at you," he added.
The director opted to make the film in 3D to do justice to the cave paintings, which use the contours of the rock for dramatic effect. The result is a visually stunning documentary that transports the viewer into the cavern and captures the artwork in all its glory. "The paintings are not just on flat walls - you have these enormous niches, bulges and protrusions, as well as stalactites and stalagmites. The effect of the three-dimensionality is phenomenal. It's a real drama which the artists of the time understood, and they used it for the drama of their paintings," Herzog said.
A trailer is already available on YouTube

Edited from Spiegel Online (16 February 2011)