It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Sunday, July 07, 2024
4,000-year-old Rock Art From A Previously Unknown Ancient Culture uncovered in Venezuela
An archaeological team in Venezuela has uncovered 20 ancient rock art sites in Canaima National Park in the southeastern part of the country, consisting of both pictograms and petroglyphs, estimated to be about 4,000 years old.
This discovery reveals a previously unknown culture, even though similar rock art has been found elsewhere in South America
The newfound rock art, referred to as pictograms, was painted in red and featured geometric shapes such as dotted lines, rows of X’s, star-shaped patterns, and interconnected straight lines. Additionally, there are simple depictions of leaves and stick figure drawings of people. Some images, known as petroglyphs, were incised into the rock and exhibit similar geometric designs.
These paintings resemble other rock art from South America, such as that from Brazil, Colombia, and Guyana, but they also show the rise of a unique cultural group that was previously unknown.
An archaeologist and researcher at Simón Bolívar University in Caracas, José Miguel Pérez-Gómez told DailyMail.com that previous studies have found no signs of human activity in the region, suggesting the art was made by a previously unknown civilization.
One area where rock art sites were found in Venezuela was near Angel Falls, the tallest land waterfall on Earth. Photo: José Miguel Pérez-Gómez
The purpose behind this art remains unclear. The various representations could be associated with topics like childbirth, illness, nature reviving, or ethical hunting. Just as churches have great meaning for people today, the sites where the rock art was made probably had great significance for the surrounding environment.
“It is almost impossible to get into the minds of people living so many [thousands of] years ago” lead researcher José Miguel Pérez-Gómez, told Live Science over email. He added that “definitely these signs had a ritual meaning.”
Ceramic and stone tool remains were also discovered at the 20 rock art sites, possibly used by the artists themselves. However, Pérez-Gómez says more research is needed to confirm this. He also stated that more rock art sites are likely to be discovered in Canaima National Park as research continues.
Rock art from Upuigma-tepui rock shelter in Canaima National Park, Venezuela. Photo: José Miguel Pérez-Gómez/Simón Bolívar University
Although it is not known precisely how old rock art is, similar rock art in Brazil has been dated to about 4,000 years ago, but Perez-Gomez believes the examples in Venezuela may be older.
The park might have been the original place where this unknown culture first developed, Perez-Gomez told Live Science, adding that they may have later dispersed to places as far away as the Amazon River, the Guianas, and even southern Colombia, which all feature rock art akin to the newly found sites in Venezuela.
The research was first presented at the “New Worlds New Ideas” prehistoric archaeological congress held in Valcamonica, Italy.
Some of the newly found rock art in Venezuela. Photo: José Miguel Pérez-Gómez/Simón Bolívar University
Cover Photo: An enhanced view showing some of the rock art discovered in Venezuela. Credit: José Miguel Pérez-Gómez
A Gold Belt Weighing 432 Grams Unearthed During Excavations in Ani Ruins is on Display
The gold belt discovered 22 years ago during excavations in the ancient city of Ani, often referred to as the “City of 1001 Churches” and “City of Forty Gates”, is on display at the Kars Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum.
Located in Kars, Türkiye, and listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, Ani is undergoing extensive archaeological excavations. It reveals its buried history through meticulous work at eight different excavation sites
During the Middle Ages, Ani was a highly significant city that prospered, especially in the tenth and thirteenth centuries. The city, renowned for its architectural wonders, was an important hub for trade, culture, and religion. The city’s distinct legacy was shaped by the blending of multiple civilizations, such as the Seljuks, Georgians, Armenians, and Byzantines.
Photo: AA
The golden belt, which was found in 2002 during the excavations carried out under the direction of Hacettepe University Faculty Member Prof. Dr. Beyhan Karamağaralı between 1989 and 2005, was kept under protection for 22 years.
The belt with various figures on it weighs 432 grams.
Hakim Aslan, Acting Director of the Kars Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum, told Anadolu Agency: “We know that Ani lived its glorious period in the Middle Ages, and archaeological excavations were started by Russian-born Nikolay Marr in Ani Ruins in the late 1800s. Later, the excavations were carried out by Turkish professors and are still continuing. The gold belt is one of the artifacts unearthed as a result of the excavations carried out in 2002 under Prof. Dr. Beyhan Karamağaralı. The artifact is very important, it is made of gold material.”
Photo: AA
The belt is made up of three components: the belt plate, the belt buckle, and the belt loops on the second textile piece. The belt has decorations and is entirely composed of gold material. The belt buckle in the middle is made with 8 slices and savat craftsmanship is seen on the edges. Savat is a very old gold and silver decoration technique that originates in Dagestan. The belt plate measures 25 centimeters in length and 2.5 centimeters in width. There is a human head figure at the end.
Pointing out that the same figures are seen in the wall paintings of the Uighur period, Hakim Aslan said, “In fact, a third eye is seen here, and the word ‘lisa’ is written on the belt buckle as well as the human figure. The word ‘lisa’ means the owner. On the ceramics we have seen before, the word lisa was used in the sense of bringing good luck and prosperity to the owner.”
A Unique Discovery in Europe: Ancient Stone Circles Cover 2,800-Year-Old Graves of Children in Norway
Archaeologists from the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo discovered an unknown burial site in a quarry near Fredrikstad, in southeastern Norway. This find has been found to contain the remains of mostly children, all of whom died more than 2,000 years ago. The burial field is unique in a European context, according to the Museum of Cultural History.
In December 2023, the team of archaeologists, led by Guro Fossum, was initially investigating ancient Stone Age settlements when they found stone formations that turned out to be burial circles.
The children, whose ages ranged from infancy to six years old at the time of their deaths, had their partially burnt bones interred directly beneath the intriguing stone circles, in exquisitely crafted ceramic pots that had long since broken into fragments. After the skeletal remains were dated, it was discovered that nearly all of the children had been buried during Norway’s Bronze and Iron Ages, between 800 and 400 BC.
“The dating shows that the burial site was used over a long period, so they couldn’t all have died in the same natural disaster or outbreak of disease or epidemic,” says Guro Fossum.
The painstakingly built stone circles were found in 2023 while excavating a rural field close to the southern Norwegian city of Fredrickstad. They were situated close to a Stone Age settlement, which was the original site being investigated, and were only 2-4 inches (5-10 cm) below the earth’s surface.
The stone formations were all between three and six feet (one and two meters) in diameter and were either perfectly round or oval-shaped. Some had larger stones placed in the middle or on their edges, signaling some diversity or creativity in the designs.
The tombs show variations in the arrangement of the cremated remains, some placed in urns and others simply under the stone circles. The amount of bones recovered was minimal in many cases, between 0.1 and 240 grams per tomb, which presented a considerable challenge for the archaeologists and osteologists involved in the study.
The children’s graves date from the transition between the Bronze and Iron Ages, with most of them buried between 800 and 400 years BCE. Photo: Museum of Cultural History
Aside from the children’s tombs, everyday objects like fire pits and kitchen pits were discovered near the site. This implies that the location may have functioned as a community gathering spot in addition to a cemetery, possibly for funeral-related events.
There was something special about the whole place. The tombs are very close together. They must have been in an open landscape, with nearby communication routes, so everyone knew about them. Furthermore, all the tombs were very beautiful and meticulously worked. Each stone came from a different place and was precisely placed in the formation. We wondered who had made such an effort, says Fossum.
The burial site, unique in the European context, has sparked interest not only for its rarity but also for its emotional implications.
An associate professor of archaeology at the University of Stavanger, Håkon Reiersen emphasizes that this find connects us deeply with the universal human emotions related to the loss and mourning of children, showing that people in the past were not so different from us in terms of how they honored their dead.
Fossum finds it interesting that men, women, and especially children had their own tombs and received the same treatment for centuries.
“It seems that the social structure was more egalitarian, as there wasn’t much difference between the graves. The same types of graves, grave goods, and burial methods were used. This suggests a society where community was important,” she said.
Only one of the graves in the field is dated to after the year 0. From that point on, burial practices gradually changed, with hierarchies and large burial mounds reserved only for those with status.
Oldest living culture: Our new research shows an Indigenous ritual passed down for 500 generations
by Russell Mullett, Ashleigh Rogers, Bruno David, Carney D. Matheson, Fiona Petchey and Nathan Wright, The Conversation
GunaiKurnai Elder Uncle Russell Mullett at entrance to Cloggs Cave, East Gippsland. Credit: Jess Shapiro, courtesy GunaiKurnai Land and Waters Aboriginal Corporation
We often hear that Aboriginal peoples have been in Australia for 65,000 years, "the oldest living cultures in the world." But what does this mean, given all living peoples on Earth have an ancestry that goes back into the mists of time?
Under the guidance of GunaiKurnai Elders, archaeologists from the GunaiKurnai Land and Waters Aboriginal Corporation and Monash University excavated at Cloggs Cave near Buchan, in the foothills of the high country near the Snowy River in East Gippsland, Victoria.
What we found was extraordinary. Under the low, subdued light in the depth of the cave, buried under layers of ash and silt, two unusual fireplaces were revealed by the tip of the trowel. They each contained a single trimmed stick associated with a tiny patch of ash.
A sequence of 69 radiocarbon dates, including on wood filaments from the sticks, date one of the fireplaces to 11,000 years ago, and the deeper of the two to 12,000 years ago, at the very end of the last Ice Age.
Matching the observed physical characteristics of the fireplaces with GunaiKurnai ethnographic records from the 19th century shows this type of fireplace has been in continuous use for at least 12,000 years.
Enigmatic sticks smeared with fat
These were no ordinary fireplaces: the upper one was the size of the palm of a human hand.
Sticking out from the middle of it was a stick, one slightly burned end still stuck into the middle of the ashes of the fire. The fire had not burned for long, nor did it reach any significant heat. No food remains were associated with the fireplace.
The 11,000 year old ritual fire in Cloggs Cave, East Gippsland. Credit: Bruno David, courtesy GunaiKurnai Land and Waters Aboriginal Corporation
Two small twigs that once grew from the stick had been trimmed off, so the stem was now straight and smooth.
We performed microscopic and biochemical analyses on the stick, showing it had come into contact with animal fat. Parts of the stick were covered with lipids—fatty acids that cannot dissolve in water and can therefore remain on objects for vast lengths of time.
The trimmings and layout of the stick, tiny size of the fire, absence of food remains, and presence of smeared fat on the stick suggest the fireplace was used for something other than cooking.
11,000-year-old lipid residues from fat covering parts of the Cloggs Cave ritual stick photographed at 400x magnification. Credit: Birgitta Stephenson, courtesy GunaiKurnai Land and Waters Aboriginal Corporation
The stick had come from a Casuarina tree, a she-oak. The branch had been broken and cut when green. We know this because of the splayed fibers at the broken end. The stick was never removed from the fire during its use; we found it where it was placed.
A second miniature fireplace slightly deeper down in the excavation also had a single branch emanating from it, this one with an angled-back end like on a throwing stick, and with five small twigs trimmed flush with the stem. It had keratin-like faunal tissue fragments on its surface; it too had come into contact with fat.
The role of these fireplaces in ritual
Local 19th-century ethnography has good descriptions of such fireplaces, so we know they were made for ritual practices performed by mulla-mullung, powerful GunaiKurnai medicine men and women.
Alfred Howitt, government geologist and pioneer ethnographer, wrote in 1887:
"The Kurnai practice is to fasten the article [something that belonged to the victim] to the end of a throwing stick, together with some eaglehawk feathers, and some human or kangaroo fat. The throwing stick is then stuck slanting in the ground before a fire, and it is of course placed in such a position that by-and-by it falls down. The wizard has during this time been singing his charm; as it is usually expressed, he "sings the man's name," and when the stick falls the charm is complete. The practice still exists."
Howitt noted that such ritual sticks were made from Casuarina wood. Sometimes the stick mimicked a throwing stick, with a hooked end. No such miniature fireplace with a single trimmed Casuarina stem smeared with fat had ever been found archaeologically before.
500 generations
The miniature fireplaces are the remarkably preserved remains of two ritual events dating back 500 generations.
Nowhere else on Earth have archaeological expressions of a very specific cultural practice known from ethnography, yet traceable so far back, previously been found.
GunaiKurnai ancestors had transmitted on Country a very detailed, very particular cultural knowledge and practice for some 500 generations.
GunaiKurnai Elder Uncle Russell Mullett was on site when the fireplaces were excavated. As the first one was revealed, he was astounded:
"For it to survive is just amazing. It's telling us a story. It's been waiting here all this time for us to learn from it. Reminding us that we are a living culture still connected to our ancient past. It's a unique opportunity to be able to read the memoirs of our Ancestors and share that with our community."
What does it mean to be one of the oldest living cultures in the world? It means despite millennia of cultural innovations, the Old Ancestors also continued to pass down cultural knowledge and know-how, generation after generation, and have done so since the last Ice Age and beyond.
More information: Bruno David et al, Archaeological evidence of an ethnographically documented Australian Aboriginal ritual dated to the last ice age, Nature Human Behaviour (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41562-024-01912-w
Sorcery in Australian Cloggs Cave may be World’s Oldest Known Culturally Transmitted Ritual
Two sticks found in a cave in Australia show signs of processing that perfectly match Aboriginal sorcery and curse-making practices described in the 19th century. Approximately 11,000–12,000 years have been estimated for the sticks, making this the longest period of time that we have evidence for a cultural practice continuing anywhere in the world.
The discovery may represent the oldest known, culturally transmitted ritual—one that persisted among local people from the last ice age to colonial times, according to a study published today in Nature Human Behaviour.
The finds were made in southeast Australia’s Cloggs Cave, a rich archeological site. Situated atop a limestone bluff with a view of the verdant Australian Alps foothills, the cavern descended approximately 12 meters below the surface, preserving an extensive legacy of Aboriginal culture. Human activity there dates back up to 25,000 years, according to earlier research.
Cloggs Cave, in Victoria’s Gippsland region, lies within the lands of the GunaiKurnai people. Representatives of the GunaiKurnai decided in 2009 that they wanted their history properly investigated and began working with anthropologists at Monash University.
Around 6,000 years ago, a large portion of the cave turned into a sinkhole, which resulted in the juxtaposition of objects from wildly disparate ages. Professor Bruno David and associates decided to concentrate on a section of the cave that was not damaged in the collapse as a result. A 40-centimeter (16-inch) long, slightly burned Casuarina stick that was surrounded by limestone rocks emerged from a hand-sized fireplace. The stick was carbon-dated as approximately 12,000 years old, making it the oldest surviving wooden artifact found in Australia.
GunaiKurnai Elder Uncle Russell Mullett and Monash University’s Professor Bruno David in Cloggs cave where evidence of the oldest continuously practiced ritual in the world has been found. Photo: Monash University
Anything wooden would rarely last that long, and the stick displayed even more remarkable qualities. Nothing like what is seen for something that was once part of a fire for warmth or food, the singeing at one end suggested it had been briefly placed in a cool fire. The stick carried lipids from human or animal fat, and twigs branching off had been carefully removed.
Further digging revealed a similar Casuarina stick, approximately a thousand years younger, but processed in the same way. Further research yielded a more comprehensive picture: Both sticks rested atop miniature fireplaces, which were little more than stone enclosures the size of palms filled with grass and twig ashes that seemed to have burned for a very short time. The sticks, the older one about 40 centimeters long and the younger one about half that length came from two species of Casuarina, flowering pine trees native to Australia with a long history of ceremonial use.
Surviving GunaiKurnai people had lost the cultural memory of what the sticks might have been used for. Researchers have therefore analyzed old ethnographic texts, which put everything in context as the evidence accumulated. In 1887, government geologist Alfred Howitt described rituals of the sorcerers who the local people called mulla-mullung. Other ethnographic texts associated Casuarina sticks with sorcery as well.
Howitt wrote in-depth accounts of mystical practices to cure the sick or curse enemies, drawing on both personal observations and accounts from Aboriginal people. One of these reports has a startling resemblance to the evidence found in the cave. A piece of clothing, a hairpiece, or a piece of food scrap was obtained by the sorcerer and attached to the end of a stick dipped in human or kangaroo fat in order to harm an enemy. The stick was then placed next to a small fire, and the mulla-mullung sung the name of the intended victim until the stick fell into the flames, enacting a fateful spell.
The stick as it was found in the cave, one end still in the fireplace in which it was lightly charred. Photo: Monash University
According to Bruno David, a lead author of the new paper and an archaeologist at Monash, the convergence of archaeological evidence and ethnographic accounts shows just how long Aboriginal traditions have survived.
“That’s 12,000 years of continuity, passing down knowledge from one generation to the next, of a cultural practice that has remained almost intact along 500 generations,” he says. “That’s absolutely remarkable.”
Rather than being a living space, the cave seems to have served mostly as a secluded den of ritual. In a series of discoveries spanning about 23,000 years, archaeologists have found ceremonial arrangements of stones, broken stalactites, a small grindstone, patches of calcite powder, and quartz crystals.
