Rebecca Wragg Sykes reviews evidence for Neanderthal art

October 9, 2019 5:40 PM

YouTuber Stefan Milo interviews archeologist Wragg Sykes about evidence for Neanderthal art (58:26 minutes). She also discusses other symbolic behavior and interactions between Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens.

Sykes' blog The Rocks Remain.

Article in PLOS about the Fumane Cave site in Italy by Marco by Peresani, et al.

Article by Ian Sample in in The Guardian about the Bruniquiel Cave site in the French Pyrenees (previously).

(Sykes previously)

posted by nangar (7 comments total)

*settles into the thread, opens up YouTube, winks at nangar*

Interactions between Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens you say? How You Doing?
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 5:55 PM on October 9, 2019 [6 favorites]

I read this as "Rebecca Wragg Sykes reviews Neanderthal art," and thought "tell me more."

This is also a good post, thanks! ;)
posted by filthy light thief at 6:31 PM on October 9, 2019 [1 favorite]

"Manuport" is definitely a word I'm going to have to start nonchalantly tossing into conversation.
posted by Not A Thing at 7:24 PM on October 9, 2019 [4 favorites]

From the manuport Wikipedia article:
Some have been attributed to pre-human hominines applying significance to pleasingly shaped natural objects such as the Makapansgat pebble, as well as to later societies.

I just love this so much, love feeling at one with my fellow humans around the world and throughout time.. imagine that one person coming across a rock and being the first one to say/think/feel/enact the concept of "Nice".
posted by bleep at 7:51 PM on October 9, 2019 [6 favorites]

Ooh, thank you for introducing me to the Makapansgat pebble. I completely love the idea of a Australopithecus finding it on their wanderings and being so fascinated by the face that they carried it back with them. I'm wondering -- has anyone ever experimented with other primates, to see if you say, gave them a bunch of wooden balls with various carvings, if they became particularly interested in the ones that looked like faces?
posted by tavella at 11:45 AM on October 10, 2019

I haven't lived where I grew up in a very long time. The stones there are very distinct: ivory-white limestone filled with crinoid fossils. Out of homesickness and a very strong tug to the homeland, everywhere I've ever lived since has ended up having a few hometown stones manuported (?) there. My ex used to joke that, millions of years in the future, archaeologists are going to think everywhere I lived was some sort of important ritual site--why else would the same stones from this one spot in the Ozarks be scattered across 6,000+ miles of very specific little sites?

So, yes, manuport is a great word. I identify with my distant forebears. We carry stones heavy with meaning.
posted by late afternoon dreaming hotel at 12:30 PM on October 10, 2019 [4 favorites]

has anyone ever experimented with other primates, to see if you say, gave them a bunch of wooden balls with various carvings, if they became particularly interested in the ones that looked like faces?

Not sure if that specific experiment has been done, but here is a review article about face processing in nonhuman primates.

Collectively, the picture that has emerged from chimpanzee studies conducted in several different laboratories provides good evidence to support the majority of face-specific specializations characteristic of human face processing, including inversion effects for expert face categories, the composite face effect and sensitivity to second-order configural cues including surface-based cues.

posted by Not A Thing at 1:06 PM on October 10, 2019