A 15th century French painting depicts an ancient stone tool

Phys dot org ^ | October 18, 2023 | Dartmouth College

[SunkenCiv]

More than 500,000 years ago, our human ancestors used large, stone tools known as "Acheulean handaxes," to cut meat and wood, and dig for tubers. Often made from flint, these prehistoric oval and pear-shaped tools are flaked on both sides and have a pointed end.

Handaxes have long been a source of fascination in our social and cultural history. Prior to the Enlightenment in the 17th and 18th centuries, people thought that they were of natural origin and referred to them as "thunderstones shot from the clouds," according to texts, with the earliest records dating back to the mid-1500s.

But researchers from Dartmouth and the University of Cambridge have identified that "The Melun Diptych" (circa 1455), painted by Jean Fouquet, depicts what is likely the earliest artistic representation of an Acheulean handaxe, demonstrating that these objects had an even earlier place in the modern world. The findings are published in the Cambridge Archaeological Journal...

The researchers found that an Acheulean handaxe appears to have been represented in the left panel... The stone object symbolizes the death by stoning of Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr.

Fouquet is considered one of the most important French artists prior to the Renaissance given his ability to work with oil paint.

Art historians have always referred to the stone in "The Melun Diptych" as a "jagged stone" or a "large, sharp stone," but no one had ever identified it as something human made. However, Steven Kangas, a senior lecturer in the Department of Art History at Dartmouth and study co-author, had a hunch that it wasn't just a rock.

[Albion Wilde]

We used to wear these to show our manhood.

LOL!

[Liz]

Nice hobby.......go for it.

[Albion Wilde]

Nobody ever chopped anything before 1800.

Dana Carvey chopped broccoli in the late 20th century.