JAKARTA, INDONESIA—Representational art discovered in a cave on Karampuang Hill on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi has been dated to at least 51,200 years ago by a team of researchers led by Adhi Agus Oktaviana of Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency, according to a BBC News report. The scientists determined the minimum age of the artwork by dating the fine layers of calcium carbonate that had formed on top of it over the millennia with a technique called laser ablation U-series analysis. The images depict a wild pig with its mouth partly open and three human-like figures. The largest human figure is holding a rod and has both of its arms extended. The second figure stands in front of the pig with its head near the pig’s snout. This figure also carries a rod, which may be at the pig’s throat. The legs of the third human figure are splayed outward, while one hand reaches for the pig’s head. “The painting tells a complex story,” said Maxime Aubert of Griffith University. “It is the oldest evidence we have for storytelling. It shows that humans at the time had the capacity to think in abstract terms,” he explained. To read about another example of one of the world’s oldest cave paintings, go to “New Dates for the Oldest Cave Paintings.”
