Unit 1: Global Prehistory

Apollo 11 Stones

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Middle Stone Age

Medium: Charcoal on stone

Location: Namibia, Windhoek (Africa)

Significance: Earliest example of rock art from Africa, shows composite form, named for the Apollo 11 space mission, similar to animal representations in cave paintings

Great Hall of the Bulls

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Paleolithic Europe

Medium: Rock painting from natural materials (ex. charcoal)

Location: Lascaux, France

Significance: Composite form, superimposed: images placed on top of each other, showcasing an animal ritual, in situ (in a cave)

Camelid Sacrum in the Shape of Canine

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Mesoamerica

Medium: Bone

Location: Tequixquiac, Central Mexico

Significance: One of the earliest cultural artifacts to have been discovered in Mesoamerica, in the zoomorphic form, a spiritual mask

Running Horned Woman

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Neolithic Period

Medium: Pigment on rock

Location: Tassili n’ Ajjer, Algeria

Significance: early evidence of African costume and ritual performance, composite view, hierarchical scale, evidence of climate change due to the raffia

Bushel with Ibex Motifs

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Neolithic Period

Medium: Painted terracotta

Location: Susa, Iran

Significance: Geometric forms, set in registers, found in a cemetery: a funerary object, friezes of indigenous animals of the Susa area: dogs, birds, pre-Islamic use of animal forms in Middle Eastern art

Anthropomorphic Stele

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Neolithic Period

Medium: Sandstone

Location: Arabian Peninsula, Saudi Arabia

Significance: funerary object, grave marker = stele, stylized in the simplicity of shapes, belted rope with knife can suggest a warrior figure

Jade Cong

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Neolithic Period

Medium: Carved Jade

Location: Liangzhu, China

Significance: Jade was a precious and expensive material, found in grave sites, funerary objects, and the hole in the middle represents the afterlife, a low relief

Stonehenge

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Neolithic Europe

Medium: Sandstone

Location: Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire, UK

Significance: Post-and-lintel, funerary site, pilgrimage site, marker of mid-summer solstice, stones in centralized plan

The Ambum Stone

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Oceanic

Medium: Greywacke stone

Location: Ambun Valley, Papua New Guinea

Significance: Zoomorphic figure, broken and repaired, which allowed for carbon dating, meant to resemble an anteater, supernatural power, spirit stone in rituals

Tlatilco female figurine

Artist: N/A

Period/Movement: Neolithic Period

Medium: Ceramic

Location: Central Mexico

Significance: Funerary object, related to women’s roles in regard to nature (fertility and maternity), two faces— multiple personalities, duality of existence, life or death.