Ancient code in Ice Age drawings solved

Heritage Daily ^ | January 5, 2023 | Markus Milligan

[SunkenCiv]

Researchers from Durham University have decoded the meaning of markings found in Ice Age drawings, providing evidence of early writing at least 20,000 years ago.

The team were studying cave art, found in at least 400 European caves such as Lascaux, Chauvet and Altamira, which contains a series of lines and dots found alongside drawings of animals...

The team has revealed that the lines and dots indicate the mating and birthing seasons of animals. A "Y" sign formed by adding a diverging line to another has also been determined to mean "giving birth".

By using the birth cycles of equivalent animals today as a reference point, the researchers were able to work out that the number of marks associated with Ice Age animals were a phenological record by lunar month of when they were mating, as well as functioned as units of communication.

The study refers to the writing as a proto-writing system, pre-dating other token-based systems that are thought to have emerged during the Near Eastern Neolithic by at least 10,000 years...

Having demonstrated that they can crack the meaning of at least some of these symbols, the team is hoping to continue their work and attempt to understand more of the symbols, their cognitive bases and what information Ice Age hunter-gatherers valued.

[ThanhPhero]

Perhaps they had ideas of preserving game so wuld time their hunt for particular species so as not interfere with natural increase of their game prey. If so it would indicae that they were not living on the edge of famine.