Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how spiritual life transformed en... https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/apr/04/ice-age-art-in...

Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how

spiritual life transformed en route to
Australia
Cave discoveries suggest Indigenous Australians’ strong connection with
animals may have its roots in the exotic species their ancestors encountered in
Sulawesi

Stencils of human hands in a cave in Sulawesi, Indonesia. New findings challenge the long-held view that hunter-gatherer
communities in the ice age of south-east Asia were culturally impoverished. Photograph: Yinika Perston

Adam Brumm and Michelle Langley for the Conversation

Tue 4 Apr 2017 00.20 EDT

cave dig in Indonesia has unearthed a unique collection of prehistoric ornaments and
artworks that date back in some instances to at least 30,000 years ago. The site is

1 of 6 3/6/18, 3:01 PM
Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how spiritual life transformed en... https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/apr/04/ice-age-art-in...

A
thought to have been used by some of the world’s earliest cave artists.

Published this week, our new findings challenge the long-held view that
hunter-gatherer communities in the Pleistocene (“ice age”) of south-east Asia
were culturally impoverished.

They also imply that the spiritual lives of humans transformed as they encountered
previously unknown species on the journey from Asia to Australia.

The human journey beyond Asia

Modern humans had colonised Australia by 50,000 years ago. It was a journey that
required people crossing by boat from continental Eurasia into Wallacea, a vast swathe of
island chains and atolls spanning the ocean gap between mainland Asia and Australia.

Wallacea, the zone of oceanic islands positioned east of the

Wallace Line, and lying between the continental regions of
Asia and Australia-New Guinea. Photograph: Adam Brumm

Archaeologists have long speculated about the cultural lives of the first homo sapiens to
enter Wallacea, as part of the great movement of our species out of Africa.

Some have argued that human culture in the Late Pleistocene attained a high level of
complexity as homo sapiens spread into Europe and as far east as India. Thereafter,
culture is thought to have declined in sophistication as people ventured into the tropics
of south-east Asia and Wallacea.

But new research in Wallacea is steadily dismantling this view.

New findings from ‘ice age’ Sulawesi

2 of 6 3/6/18, 3:01 PM
Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how spiritual life transformed en... https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/apr/04/ice-age-art-in...

In the latest addition to this rash of discoveries, we describe a suite of previously

undocumented symbolic artefacts excavated from a limestone cavern on Sulawesi, the
largest island in Wallacea.

The artefacts were dated using a range of methods to between 30,000 and 22,000 years
ago. They include disc-shaped beads made from the tooth of a babirusa, a primitive pig
found only on Sulawesi, and a “pendant” fashioned from the finger bone of a bear
cuscus, a large possum-like creature also unique to Sulawesi.

Prehistoric ornaments excavated from the cave of Leang Bulu

Bettue on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. Photograph:
Michelle Langley/Adam Brumm/Luke Marsden/Shutterstock

Also recovered were stone tools inscribed with crosses, leaf-like motifs and other
geometric patterns, the meaning of which is obscure.

Further evidence for symbolic culture was shown by the abundant traces of rock art
production gleaned from the cave excavations. They include used ochre pieces, ochre
stains on tools and a bone tube that may have been an “airbrush” for creating stencil art.

All are from deposits that are the same age as dated cave paintings in the surrounding
limestone hills.

It is very unusual to uncover buried evidence for symbolic activity in the same places
where ice age rock art is found. Prior to this research, it also remained uncertain whether
or not the Sulawesi cave artists adorned themselves with ornaments, or even if their art
extended beyond rock painting.

3 of 6 3/6/18, 3:01 PM
Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how spiritual life transformed en... https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/apr/04/ice-age-art-in...

A drilled and perforated finger bone from a bear cuscus. The

hole at one end of the bone formerly bore a string, while wear
marks on the ornament show it repeatedly rubbed against
human skin or clothing. These suggest the bone was
suspended for use as a pendant or similar jewellery object.
Photograph: Luke Marsden

Early art and ornaments from Wallacea

Previous cave excavations in Timor-Leste have unearthed 42,000-year-old shells used as
“jewellery”, as reported in 2016. In 2014 archaeologists announced that cave art from
Sulawesi is among the oldest surviving on the planet.

At one cave, a depiction of a human hand is at least 40,000 years old. It was made by
someone pressing their palm and fingers flat against the ceiling and spraying red paint
around them.

Next to the hand stencil is a painting of a babirusa that was created at least 35,400 years
ago.

These artworks are compatible in age with the spectacular cave paintings of rhinos,
mammoths and other animals from France and Spain, a region long thought to be the
birthplace of modern artistic culture.

Some prehistorians have even suggested that the presence of 40,000-year-old art in
Indonesia means that rock art probably arose in Africa well before our species set foot in
Europe, although an Asian origin is also conceivable.

Based on the new evidence emerging from Timor and Sulawesi, it now appears that the
story about early humans in Wallacea being less culturally advanced than people
elsewhere, especially Palaeolithic Europeans, is wrong.

The weird world of Wallacea

Owing to the unique biogeography of Wallacea, the first modern humans to enter this
archipelago would have encountered a strangely exotic world filled with animals and
plants they had never imagined existed.

Surrounded by deep ocean troughs, the roughly 2,000 islands of Wallacea are extremely
difficult for non-flying organisms to reach. Because of their inaccessibility, these islands
tend to be inhabited by relatively few land mammals. Endemic lineages would have

4 of 6 3/6/18, 3:01 PM
Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how spiritual life transformed en... https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/apr/04/ice-age-art-in...

arisen on many islands as a result of this evolutionary isolation.

Sulawesi is the weirdest island of them all. Essentially all of the island’s terrestrial
mammals, except for bats, occur nowhere else on Earth. Sulawesi was probably where
human beings first laid eyes on marsupials (cuscuses).

The discovery of ornaments manufactured from the bones and teeth of babirusas and
bear cuscuses – two of Sulawesi’s most characteristic endemic species – implies that the
symbolic world of the newcomers changed to incorporate these never-before-seen
creatures.

Our excavations have unearthed thousands of animal bones and teeth, but only a tiny
fraction are from babirusas. The near-absence of babirusas from the cave inhabitants’
diet, coupled with the portrayal of these animals in their art, and use of their body parts
as “jewellery”, suggests these rare and elusive creatures had acquired particular
symbolic value in ice age human culture.

Perhaps the first Sulawesians felt a strong spiritual connection with these odd-looking
mammals.

This “social interaction” with the novel species of Wallacea is likely to have been
essential to the initial human colonisation of Australia with its unprecedentedly rich
communities of endemic faunas and floras, including many species of megafauna that
are now extinct.

In fact, elements of the complex human-animal spiritual relationships that characterise

Aboriginal cultures of Australia could well have their roots in the initial passage of
people through Wallacea and the first human experiences of the curious animal life in
this region.

Adam Brumm is a principal research fellow at Griffith University. Michelle Langley is a

•

Decra research fellow at Griffith University. This article was originally published on the
Conversation, part of the Guardian Comment Network.

Since you’re here …

… we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever but
advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news
organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as
we can. So you can see why we need to ask for your help. The Guardian’s independent,
investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do
it because we believe our perspective matters – because it might well be your
perspective, too.

I appreciate there not being a paywall: it is more democratic for the media to be available
for all and not a commodity to be purchased by a few. I’m happy to make a contribution so

5 of 6 3/6/18, 3:01 PM
Ice age art in Indonesia reveals how spiritual life transformed en... https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/apr/04/ice-age-art-in...

others with less means still have access to information. Thomasine F-R.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps fund it, our future would be
much more secure. For as little as $1, you can support the Guardian – and it only takes a
minute. Thank you.

Support the Guardian

Topics
Anthropology +

6 of 6 3/6/18, 3:01 PM