Talk:Cave painting

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Contents 1 Lascaux 2 Improvement drive 3 Geographic scope 4 POV removed, pending citation 5 copyvio problems with Laas Gaa'l article -- can anyone help? 6 Guthrie and Stone 7 Russian cave 8 End dates 9 Recent material 9.1 More information 9.2 Prehistory 9.3 Cave Paintings as Early Writing 9.4 Cro-Magnon Speech, Words, and Names 9.5 Cave Paintings Tell About a Culture 9.6 Og, Ugga, and Base-Thirty Arithmetic 9.7 Communication 9.8 Contributions to probability theory 10 Blombos Caves 11 Problem in first para of article 12 Deleted Merlin Stone and Graham Hancock

[edit] Lascaux

In answer to your question regarding cave painting, Robot was the name of the dog who discovered the cave paintings at Lascaux (fell into hole and was found barking at the paintings). --Daniel C. Boyer

does the dog itself really need an article? Woudln't a mention on the Lascaux page be enough? -- Tarquin 20:41 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I think a mention on the Lascaux pag would be adequate, as Robot didn't really accomplish anything else. --Daniel C. Boyer

Shouldn't this be deleted if more information hasn't been added? Wikipedia is NOT a dictionary. - Kricxjo

IMHO, no. Cave painting is certainly worthy of an encyclopedia article. Just because this entry is only a few lines long is no reason to delete it; it'll be filled out over time. That's the spirit of Wikipedia. Atorpen 17:34 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)

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Oldest multimedia? According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal almost all such prehistoric decorations, both cave paintings and ancient rock paintings in the American West, are located where there is some unusual echo or other sound effect. Sorry I don't have the citation, but maybe someone else well know more about it and can add something. Ortolan88

Does anybody know any details about the stone hand axe found in a Spanish cave that's on display in New York right now? It was supposedly found in the largest grouping of hominid fossils (Home heidelbergensis) ever found. -- Zoe

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[http://www.drakensberg-tourism.com/bushman-rock-art.html This is an interesting link about Drakensberg, but is an advert for a tour company, so I don't want to put it on the page. A recent BBC article on Drakensber Mark Richards 17:24, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Improvement drive

Graphics is currently nominated to be improved by WP:IDRIVE. Vote for it if you want to contribute.--Fenice 20:12, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Geographic scope

Why isn't there any info on cave paintings in Asia or the Americas? I know for a fact that there is a lot of cave art in Asia. SCHZMO ✍ 19:39, 2 June 2006 (UTC) I agree, i was studying this in social studies and wondered about it as well. Adolph172

[edit] POV removed, pending citation

Looking around, I could find little substantiation of the idea that the paintings were widely believed to be a creationist hoax. It's more than possible that the referenced Emile Cartailhac did indeed believe the Altamira paintings to be a "creationist hoax", but I can only find that he later issued a Mea Culpa for having believed the paintings were a hoax...no mention of creationism. Furthermore, I would question the importance of the views of a single prehistorian - and would further assert that this basically-insignificant information may simply be intended to make "evolutionists" look silly. I have seen multiple instances of similar POV on wikipedia. The assertion in question is simply too insignificant, too poorly sourced, and too POV to remain without proper citation of a primary source. 68.162.17.105 19:34, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] copyvio problems with Laas Gaa'l article -- can anyone help?

Hi all -- The article on the Laas Gaa'l paintings (which was recently featured on the front page as a "Did you know?" item) contains some text plagiarized from a BBC article, and the image also appears to be a copyvio from the BBC. The person who originally created the article using the plagiarized text has become very combative, and keeps deleting the copyvio tags. If anyone has the expertise to help in rewriting that article without the plagiarisms, that would be very helpful. I would also appreciate it if some other people could take a look at the discussion on the article's talk page, because the situation seems to be degenerating into an edit war, which I don't want to get involved in.--24.52.254.62 04:44, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I found nothing here about Bhimbetka - the largest and oldest cave painting site in India. Though the quality of the drawings can not be compared with Alta Mira, they are said to be 10,000 years old. Could someone please give more information? D.Mitra

[edit] Guthrie and Stone

I'm wondering about some of the material related to Guthrie and Stone. It talks about human figurines, goddesses, etc., but there are only a couple human figures among the cave paintings in Europe, and they are more like stick figures than goddesses. It almost seems like this material shouldn't be here. I feel like this article gets off track. TimidGuy 21:17, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Russian cave

Someone added this in the Europe section but I moved it here:

• Kopova, near Ufa, Russia

It doesn't belong in the Europe section. If we can find out more info about it, then we could create a separate section on it, TimidGuy 11:18, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] End dates

I am puzzled by "The practice died out 10.000 years ago". On Sicilia the quite extensive eneolithic paintings (.. complicati e astrusi arzigogoli lineari e geometrici) in the 'Grotta dei Cavalli' probably date from 3rd mill BC (Tusa). --Nedermaen 21:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. I was going by what the source says that I was using -- the book The Cave Painters by Curtis. I added a qualifier to allow for exceptions. Does that help? TimidGuy 14:59, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, thanks.

Although I think more accurately would be: "Other examples may date as late as the Early Bronze Age, but the well known prolific and sophisticated style from Lascaux and Altamira died out about 10,000 years ago".

I'm no expert but I'd like to make additional suggestions based on: "Sicily Before History" Robert Leighton "Sicilia Preistorica" Sebastino Tusa "Atlas of Ancient Archaeology" Jacquetta Hawkes My own 'field work', ha, ha. Repeat these are suggestions only.

1) I would suggest that "Cave Art" is a better title for the entry;

  with a pointer from "Cave Paintings" and a 'see also' from "Rock Art"
  and "Petroglyphs". Point 2) will clarify.

2) There seem to be distinct styles in these works:

  a) The well known sophisticated painted figuratives (mainly animals
     it seems) from Lascaux, Altamira, etc. All associated with our
     Cro-Magnon grandparents?
  b) Sculpted three dimensional animals as in Cap Blanc (les Eyzies).
  c) Primitive painted stick figures and symbols on Sicily; similar to 
     CavePainting1.jpg in the entry (Whence that example?).
  d) Sophisticated engraved figures (animals and humans) on Sicily.
  e) Silhouettes or outlines of hand, feet, leaves etc. (handprints).
 (f) Simple unexplained scratches and hatches.) 

3) Sicily should be added, I know half a dozen good examples (Leighton

     lists several more):
     Grotta Audura - extensively documented, but, I believe, undated.  
     Grotta dei Genovesi - extensively documented. Style d) is reportedly
        12.000 years old. Also style c), but I cannot find dates.
     Grotte Niscemi - Style d) (I can provide a reasonably clear photo).
     Grotta dei Cavalli - Style c) (Neolitico Medio e Finale (Tusa))
        (Similar to Porto Badisco (Apulia) and therefore Middle
         Neolithic-Early Copper (Leighton)).
     Grotta Racchio - Style d) a deer and goats; but I could only find
        less exciting scratches f).
     Grotta dei Signora - confusing, may be 'modern', I cannot find
        references.

This is probably more than you asked for. I'd be happy to follow your lead on how to proceed,--Nedermaen 19:54, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

It's really great that you're taking an interest in this article. It was a hodgepodge when I first began looking at it, and had a fair amount of vandalism that had been there a while. You seem knowledgeable. I don't have much time at the moment, but my quick impression is that we add a short section about Sicily and direct readers to a separate article on Sicily's paintings. I would love to organize the article around the distinct styles you outline. And I would love to separate out the rock painting, given that there's already an article on that. I'm glad you pointed that out. I can see your point about "cave art." I guess my only reservation would be that the term "cave paintings" is so widely familiar. I would be inclined to reorganize the article along the different styles, and to have the first part be about painting. Then a major section on cave art. Just some quick thoughts. Will be back later or tomorrow. Thanks so much for your interest in this article. TimidGuy 11:43, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I added your suggested sentence to the article. TimidGuy 15:37, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Recent material

I'm putting here material that was recently added. There are serious problems with the writing. A very small portion of the material is marginally accurate but much of it is in inappropriate style for an encyclopedia and appears to be vandalism. Further, much of it is speculative. It's possible that a few points could be included but it would need to be extensively rewritten. TimidGuy 12:03, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Of course, I appreciate the humor. : ) TimidGuy 15:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

This discussion has been archived. Please do not modify it.
The following is an archived debate. Please do not modify it.
[edit] More information DAMASCUS (Reuters) - French archaeologists have discovered an 11,000-year-old wall painting underground in northern Syria which they believe is the oldest in the world Reference: Khaled Yacoub Oweis Thu Oct 11, 12:05 PM ET The 2 square-meter painting, in red, black and white, was found at the Neolithic settlement of Djade al-Mughara on the Euphrates, northeast of the city of Aleppo, team leader Eric Coqueugniot told Reuters. "It looks like a modernist painting. Some of those who saw it have likened it to work by (Paul) Klee. Through carbon dating we established it is from around 9,000 B.C.," Coqueugniot said. "We found another painting next to it, but that won't be excavated until next year. It is slow work," said Coqueugniot, who works at France's National Centre for Scientific Research. Rectangles dominate the ancient painting, which formed part of an adobe circular wall of a large house with a wooden roof. The site has been excavated since the early 1990s. The painting will be moved to Aleppo's museum next year, Coqueugniot said. Its red came from burnt hematite rock, crushed limestone formed the white and charcoal provided the black. The world's oldest painting on a constructed wall was one found in Turkey but that was dated 1,500 years after the one at Djade al-Mughara, according to Science magazine. The inhabitants of Djade al-Mughara lived off hunting and wild plants. They resembled modern day humans in looks but were not farmers or domesticated, Coqueugniot said. "There was a purpose in having the painting in what looked like a communal house, but we don't know it. The village was later abandoned and the house stuffed with mud," he said. A large number of flints and weapons have been found at the site as well as human skeletons buried under houses. "This site is one of several Neolithic villages in modern day Syria and southern Turkey. They seem to have communicated with each other and had peaceful exchanges," Coqueugniot said. Mustafa Ali, a leading Syrian artist, said similar geometric design to that in the Djade al-Mughara painting found its way into art throughout the Levant and Persia, and can even be seen in carpets and kilims (rugs). "We must not lose sight that the painting is archaeological, but in a way it's also modern," he said. France is an important contributor to excavation efforts in Syria, where 120 teams are at work. Syria was at the crossroads of the ancient world and has thousands of mostly unexcavated archaeological sites. Swiss-German artist Paul Klee had links with the Bauhaus school and was important in the German modernist movement. [edit] Prehistory Me Og, also known as Og or Ogg was a Cro-Magnon who was the leading inventor, scientist and mathematician of his day. He lived approximately 30,000 years ago in what is now Europe, and was responsible for many discoveries. Og's mate, Ugga, developed a numerical system which used a rudimentary form of base thirty. The names Me Og and Ugga (or Og or Ogg) have been interpreted, translated, and transliterated through the study of linguistics and cryptography, by means of cave paintings, which also served as an early alphabet. (See http://www.historyofscience.com/G2I/docs/timeline/index.shtml; Notation dans les gravures du Paléelithique Supérieur, Alexander Marshack, 1970; The Roots of Civilization, Alexander Marshack, 1972; http://home.sou.edu/~morganm/cavepaint.html, Houghton Mifflin web page, http://www.rundetaarn.dk/engelsk/observatorium/archaeoas.htm, Hugh Thurston, Early Astronomy, Springer Verlag New York 1994, Astronomisk tidsskrift nr. 4/1986, 2/1987 og 2/1994, Jens Vellev, Danske solure fra middelalderen, Hikuin, 6/1980, Eden and Lloyd, The book of Sun-dials, Bell & sons, 1900; E. Laumann Jørgensen, Stjerner, Sten og Stænger, Arkæo-Astronomi i Danmark, Hernov 1994.,Hu and Wen, Asian prehistory,1981.) [edit] Cave Paintings as Early Writing One of the most surprising findings was a cave in France at Chauvet-Pont-D'Arc. In 1994, Jean Chauvet discovered this cave with amazingly sophisticated cave paintings estimated to be 31,000 years old (Zoogoer, Smithsonian, July-August, 1997). Cave paintings include animals that were not on the menu. There are drawings of various dangerous beasts. There is a link between these cave paintings and early pictographic writing. Furthermore, hundreds of other caves paintings have been discovered. (see Archeology magazine, When the Reindeer-Hunters came to Cro-Magnon, Odyssey, May, 2004, pp. 36- 39). Moreover, the Cro-Magnon cave of Les Eyzies the city today regarded as the once upon a time capital of pre-history in France. Figures of birds in this important Cro-Magnon cave are apparently the precursor of the hieroglyph that became the letter a or aleph. In addition to living creatures are geometric figures (Zoogoer, Smithsonian, July-August, 1997) that constitute an early form of writing, time-keeping, and computation. Until recently, it appeared that “preliterate” cave artists developed drawing and writing 15,000 to 25,000 years ago in places like Lascaux, France. Now, it looks as if proto-writing goes back much further. On a sandstone mountain and on surrounding stones, scientists discovered thousands of small, carved circles. These circles were also found on button-like stones which average 1.2 inches in diameter. All of these circles date from more than 60,000 years ago. Archaeologists calculate that it would have taken 900 days for a person working alone eight hours per day to carve the buttons. The circles must have been “of enormous cultural importance” to those who carved them (Wilford, 1996, Sheridan, Drawing, Writing, and the New Literacy, 1997). [edit] Cro-Magnon Speech, Words, and Names Furthermore, a well-formed larynx developed in Cro-Magnons approximately nearly 300,000 years ago, allowing Cro-Magnons to speak using vowel sounds like ah, ee and oo as well as consonents such as g and m. Most experts believe that speech developed gradually.Anatomist Jeffrey Laitman of Johns Hopkins University studied the development and position of the human larynx by examining the base of hominid skulls. Laitman discovered that Australopithecus had vocal tracts much like living apes. He was unable to study the base of Homo habilis crania as they are fragmentary, but Homo erectus had a larynx with an equivalent position to that of an 8-year-old modern child. He beleives that it was after 300,000 years ago, with the appearance of archaic Homosapiens, that the larynx assumed its modern form and position, leading to a rich range of sounds. (M. Fagan, The Journey From Eden, London: Thames and Hudson, 1990, p. 87; The Lapedo Child, THE Szeleta Men, and the Convergence to Leading Cultures, B. Lukács, President of the Matter Evolution Subcommittee of the Geonomic Scientific Committee of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, CRIP RMKI H-1525 Bp. 114. Pf. 49., Budapest, Hungary) Therefore, from the cave paintings found, using well-established techniques, the pictures form words m-ee,ah-g, and oo-g-ah which we transliterate as Me Og and Ugga respectively. Since drawings of a man and a woman were found near these words, they are almost certainly their names. In addition, cave drawings show the man creating and using tools; a primitve bow, an early arrow, and a wheel in the form of a nearly perfect circle. The man is sometimes depicted as a human-beast hybrid. Of course, he used the atlatl but probably did not invent it, since the atlatl has been used for at least 40, 000 years (see Ingenious Machines web site). The bone calculator has been found. See the references under the article history of mathematics, section on prehistory. [edit] Cave Paintings Tell About a Culture Maturity was at age thirteen years, as indicated by bone calculators using base thirty for numbers of days that passed, when Me Og went through his rite of passage, which included feats of strength, hunting skill demonstrated by killing European cave lion (Panthera leo), display of pain tolerance, ability to read cave paintings in a chant, followed by a party with tribal music, dance, and food. Cave paintings of European lions and of the traditions of the day have been found (Hu, European and Asian Prehistory,1973, , Wen, Asian Prehistory and Watt, European Prehistory, Archaeology ). Me Og was responsible for the invention of the bow, the modern arrow, an improved sling, the bone calculator, and a nearly perfect circular wheel, according to the story told by cave paintings. [edit] Og, Ugga, and Base-Thirty Arithmetic Many female Cro-Magnons kept records of their monthly cycles (again, see article on history of mathematics and the references under pre-history). However, it was Ugga who suggested to Og that they build a bone calculator. Bones of animals that had been used for food and skins were joined by sinew. Using her monthly periodic cycle as a base, Ugga suggested to Og that the bones be arranged so that the rotation of the first bone through thirty turns would then move the next bone, then the next, and the next. Consequently, they were able to compute values up to 30-cubed, that is, 30 to the third power, or 27,000. [edit] Communication "Humans are symbol-making creatures. We communicate by symbols -- growls and grunts, hand signals and drawings painted on cave walls in pre-historic times. Later we developed languages, associating sounds with ideas. Eventually Homo Sapiens developed writing, perhaps first symbols scratched on rocks, then written more permanently on tablets, papyrus, and paper. Today we transmit symbols -- coded digital signals of voice, graphics, video and data -- around the world at close to the speed of light." From: Bell Labs Celebrates 50 years of Information Theory. [edit] Contributions to probability theory Og and Ugga contributed to probability theory, especially empirical measures. Og say: How many buffolo we catch this moon? Ugga say: three. Og ask: How many we try to catch? Ugga say: thirty. So empitical measure of 3/30 = 0.1 was invented.

[edit] Blombos Caves

I'm moving here a comment that was top-posted by an anonymous user and that messed up the formatting of the Talk page:

In the BLOMBOS CAVES in South Africa there have been found cave art including decorative beads and bones with indents SUGGESTING COUNTING and geometric shapes on them that date back to 140000 yrs they have also found evidence of fishing,further more the ISHANGO BONES found in africa date back to 37000 yrs old making it the worlds oldest discovered mathmatical artifact the bones demonstrate multiplication division prime numbers.if u dont believe me type in BLOMBOS CAVES OR ISHANGO BONES in ur wikipedia browser ME OG was was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayy behind the powercurve.

Sounds like an interesting discovery. What's with ME OG, though? Why did someone put all that stuff in the article and now this anonymous editor is again referencing it? Something in popular culture? TimidGuy (talk) 12:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Problem in first para of article

The text says: "The earliest known rock paintings are dated to the Upper Paleolithic, 40,000 years ago, while the earliest European cave paintings date to 32,000 years ago." The rest of the article doesn't mention any rock paintings older than the oldest European ones, and actually mentions Chauvet as the oldest known painting. This fits with what I know, but I don't know enough to go and edit the text myself. Are there actually older known cave paintings outside Europe? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sciamanna (talk • contribs) 20:26, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to cut all mentions of rock painting from this article, since there's a separate article on that. I do believe that African rock art dates earlier than the European cave paintings. TimidGuy (talk) 20:37, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Oh shoot. I confess that I hadn't even noticed that "cave painting" and "rock painting" referred to two separate things -- I'd assumed they were two ways of referring to the same thing. Tells you how little I know, but also maybe this should be made clearer in the article(s). (Oh and sorry for not signing my previous comment. I'm learning.) Sciamanna (talk) 09:50, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

I've added a note on the Talk page of the article on Rock art suggesting that we move all the info on rock art that's in this article to the rock art article. Maybe this will help avoid the confusion. TimidGuy (talk) 12:21, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Deleted Merlin Stone and Graham Hancock

I deleted the information sourced to Merlin Stone and Graham Hancock. Both of these individuals have produced theories that are very controversial. Per WP:FRINGE I think they are best not included here and that would should stick with the more mainstream sources.

In a thread above I also questioned Guthrie. My mistake. I'm reading his book, and it's excellent. Very scholarly, based on published research. I may use it as a source for some of the information in this article that isn't yet sourced. TimidGuy (talk) 15:07, 3 June 2008 (UTC)