Radiocarbon Dates Reveal That New Guinea Art Is Older Than Thought

Eureka Alert/ UA ^ | 10-13-2005 | Lori Stiles

[blam]

GGG Ping.

[Ditter]

NG art is older than thought? Wow, they were making art before they were thinking. I think some artist are STILL making art without thinking.

[TChris]

NG art is older than thought? Wow, they were making art before they were thinking. I think some artist are STILL making art without thinking.

LOL! You beat me to it!

[Moral Hazard]

"Radiocarbon Dates Reveal That New Guinea Art Is Older Than Thought"

How were they able to make art before they were able to think about it?

[Moral Hazard]

And you both beat me. How much you want to bet this ends up on Best of the Web?

[xcamel]

They could have said "Older than white lawn sausages.."

/sarc.

[Leo Carpathian]

"Chris agreed that the dates, if correct, are absolutely extraordinary and will have a significant impact on the New Guinean people as well as the region's anthropology and archaeology."

Like, they will come down from the trees? This must be hugh!

[blam]

"Like, they will come down from the trees? This must be hugh!"

They had figured out farming well before your ancestors.

"The gardens of the New Guinea highlands are ancient, intensive permacultures, adapted to high population densities, very high rainfalls (as high as 10,000mm/yr (400in/yr)), earthquakes, hilly land, and occasional frost. Complex mulches, crop rotations and tillages are used in rotation on terraces with complex irrigation systems. Western agronomists still do not understand all practices, and native gardeners are notably more successful than most scientific farmers. Some authorities believe that New Guinea gardeners invented crop rotation well before western europeans. "

[monkey]

New Guinea has the highest cultural and linguistic diversity in the world.

There are about 6000 languages in the world; 800 in New Guinea.

[blam]

"There are about 6000 languages in the world; 800 in New Guinea."

The more diversity there is usually equals the oldest.

[JimSEA]

The discovery of wooden artifact several hundred years old would seem is mean that people actively preserved the wood as is the common practice in the rest of Southeast Asia. I know of several temples where the collections include wooden objects that they claim up to 1,800 years of age which would match the earliest Dvaravati Cultures. 800 Year old Dvaravati wooden Buddhas images are on display in the temple museum in Lamphuin where that age is consistent with the Stupa and laterite foundation as well as written record in the Chiang Mai and Nan Chronicles. The Buddhist are great preservers of ancients writings and objects related to Buddhism but are understandably reluctant to allow destructive testing (even of the smallest amount).

The diversity of languages, as you have said before, is not surprising as the cultures today survived the ancient flooding of the subcontinental shelf where most of the earliest cultures originated. The lack of early high cultures and then the "explosion" of highly developed Ban Chiang and Vietnamese Don Song Cultures between 3,500 and 5,000 years ago point to possible multiple centers of early civilization. Just now, the University of Pennsylvania is expanding their study of the Ban Chiang Culture to include Mekong sites going back 10,000 years. Along the great rivers and under the ocean seem the be the locations of the oldest peoples -- as one would expect.

Even the Chinese are -- reluctantly -- moving away from their dogmatic insistence on a Yellow River origin of all Eastern Cultures. They are pushed by the Southwest China discoveries -- Sichuan and Yunnan.

[blam]

Thanks for your inputs.

"...the University of Pennsylvania is expanding their study of the Ban Chiang Culture to include Mekong sites going back 10,000 years. "

The Ban Chiang Culture will have some more suprises.

Wasn't it in a Ban Chiang site that the oldest bronze smeltering in the world was found?

[JimSEA]

Wasn't it in a Ban Chiang site that the oldest bronze smeltering in the world was found?

Yes. There has been some controversy as the dating was contested by the Chinese and French (believed the bronze had "sifted down" from more recent graves into older graves also contested dating procedure). The bronze was used mostly for decorative and farming implements. There is not much sign of warfare until the Iron Age (500 BC) and the culture fades out around 200 AD with the Indianized Cultures and the Khmer gaining the upper hand. The Vietnamese are depoliticizing their studies so we should soon know more about the Dong Son culture and its relationships with other surrounding areas. It is a remarkable culture going back to the neolithic and had very early bronze casting such that the Dong Son drums have never been equaled.

[blam]

"It is a remarkable culture going back to the neolithic and had very early bronze casting such that the Dong Son drums have never been equaled."

I think I remember posting articles about the Dong Son drums here on FR.

[JimSEA]

I remember your posting them as well. If I recall correctly, it was a couple of years back when two or three drums, cast in today's Vietnam, were found in Hunnan.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Blam.

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[ASA Vet]

Ban Chiang is quite interesting. You really should go there someday. I've been there twice and will go again.

[blam]

"Ban Chiang is quite interesting. You really should go there someday. I've been there twice and will go again."

LOL. I'm saving myself for Skara Brae.

[Wiseghy]

For the proponents of ID, here is your smoking gun.

Humans are much smarter, and beauty of our art and culture is much deeper than evolution could possibly call for. This depth developed much earlier than anyone imagined in nearly all peoples.

It may not be a scientific argument, yet, but it is a strongly intuitive one that jives with my faith. I need no further "proof" of God's hand in the development of our souls.