ADELAIDE, AUSTRALIA—According to a statement released by the University of Adelaide, a possible 3-D map has been identified in a rock shelter in the Paris Basin of northern France, by Médard Thiry of the PSL Research University and Anthony Milnes of the University of Adelaide. Earlier work in the rock shelter has shown that the sandstone had been worked in the Late Paleolithic period to create images of horses and a female form that included an outflow of water. Thiry and his colleagues now suggest that the floor of the rock shelter was also modified to reflect the shape of the surrounding landscape and water flowing through it. “What we’ve described is not a map as we understand it today—with distances, directions, and travel times—but rather a three-dimensional miniature depicting the functioning of a landscape, with runoff from the highlands into streams and rivers, the convergence of valleys, and the downstream formation of lakes and swamps,” Milnes said. The modifications made to the sandstone by the Paleolithic people would have created flow paths for rainwater into the rock shelter, he explained. “This completely new discovery offers a better understanding and insight into the capacity of these early humans,” Thiry concluded. To read more about mapmakers through time, go to "Mapping the Past."
