Museum of Prehistoric Thera in Fira, Santorini: Wall painting of grey langur monkeys at Akrotiri on the Greek island of Thera (Santorini) [Milan Gonda/Alamy]
Posted on 02/04/2020 1:46:16 PM PST by SunkenCiv
A Bronze Age painting on a Greek island shows a monkey from thousands of kilometres away in Asia. The finding suggests that ancient cultures separated by great distances were trading and exchanging ideas.
The artwork is one of several wall paintings in a building at Akrotiri on the Greek island of Thera (Santorini) in the Aegean Sea. Akrotiri was a settlement of the Minoan civilisation in Bronze Age Greece that was buried by ash from a volcanic eruption in around 1600 BC.
Many of the paintings show monkeys, yet there were no monkeys in Greece at the time. Most of the monkeys have been identified as Egyptian species like olive baboons. This makes sense because Egypt was in contact with the Minoan civilisation, which was spread across several Aegean islands. However, others were harder to identify.
Marie Nicole Pareja at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia teamed up with primatologists to re-examine the mystery monkey paintings. One stood out. "When they looked at this wall painting, they all straight away unambiguously said ëthat's a langur'," says Pareja.
The team has identified the monkey as a grey langur (Semnopithecus). As well as its distinctive fur, the monkey was depicted holding its tail in a characteristic S shape.
Grey langurs live in southern Asia in what is now Nepal, Bhutan and India -- and particularly in the Indus Valley. During the Bronze Age, the region was home to the Indus Valley Civilisation, one of the most important societies of that time. Although it was past its peak, the Indus Valley Civilisation was still advanced for its time, with large cities and elaborate water supply systems.
(Excerpt) Read more at newscientist.com ...
Museum of Prehistoric Thera in Fira, Santorini: Wall painting of grey langur monkeys at Akrotiri on the Greek island of Thera (Santorini) [Milan Gonda/Alamy]
Akrotiri was a settlement of the Minoan civilisation in Bronze Age Greece that was buried by ash from a volcanic eruption in around 1600 BC.
IOW, one of *those* topics.
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Tell the truth, did you only click on this link because of the word “wildly” ?
Maybe the monkeys traveled widely.
The ancient Cretans drove their 4x4’s all the way to India. So I’m told
Maybe ... it means monkeys traveled widely back then.
A Bronze Age painting on a Greek island shows a monkey from thousands of kilometres away in Asia.
Wouldn’t it have been incredibly tiny from that far away?
Maybe there used to be monkeys in Greece?.........Have people never heard of Greece Monkeys?.......................
Monkeys were bigger back then................
Those are possums.
You can’t swing a Spartan in Greece without hitting a possum.
Turns out that possums really like olives.....in their martinis.
Well, one could argue that Alexander the Great covered / visited much of the known world.
I’ll bet that’s a tail you tell everyone.
Good one!
Some of those s shaped tails look like a c to me.
Maybe those were monkeys who didn’t win the spelling bee.
On behalf of grease monkey’s everywhere, you should be ashamed.
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![Museum of Prehistoric Thera in Fira, Santorini: Wall painting of grey langur monkeys at Akrotiri on the Greek island of Thera (Santorini) [Milan Gonda/Alamy]](http://images.newscientist.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/11153413/h8nh0b.jpg)
