Narrative cave art in Indonesia by 51,200 years ago.

ABSTRACT: Previous dating research indicated that the Indonesian island of Sulawesi is host to some of the oldest known rock art^1-3. That work was based on solution uranium-series (U-series) analysis of calcite deposits overlying rock art in the limestone caves of Maros-Pangkep, South Sulawesi^1-3. Here we use a novel application of this approach-laser-ablation U-series imaging-to re-date some of the earliest cave art in this karst area and to determine the age of stylistically similar motifs at other Maros-Pangkep sites. This method provides enhanced spatial accuracy, resulting in older minimum ages for previously dated art. We show that a hunting scene from Leang Bulu' Sipong 4, which was originally dated using the previous approach to a minimum of 43,900 thousand years ago (k

SUBMITTER: Oktaviana AA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11269172 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature