Unit 1: Global Prehistory, 30,000–500 BCE

Contextualization of Prehistoric Art

Prehistoric art refers to the art created by humans before the invention of writing.
It is important to contextualize prehistoric art in order to understand its meaning and significance.
Cultural context, historical context, and environmental context are three important factors to consider when contextualizing prehistoric art.
Cultural context includes the beliefs, values, and practices of the people who created the art.
Historical context includes the events and circumstances that were happening at the time the art was created.
Environmental context includes the physical surroundings and natural resources available to the people who created the art.
By considering these contexts, we can gain a better understanding of the purpose and meaning behind prehistoric art.

Materials, Processes, and Techniques in Prehistoric Art

Materials * Stone: Prehistoric artists used stone to create sculptures, tools, and weapons. They used different types of stone, such as flint, obsidian, and jade, depending on availability and suitability for their purpose. * Bone: Bone was used to create tools, weapons, and decorative objects. It was often carved or engraved with intricate designs. * Ivory: Ivory was used to create small sculptures and decorative objects. It was often carved with intricate designs. * Clay: Clay was used to create pottery and figurines. Prehistoric artists would shape the clay by hand or using simple tools, and then fire it to harden it. * Pigments: Prehistoric artists used natural pigments such as charcoal, ochre, and manganese dioxide to create paintings and drawings. These pigments were often mixed with water or animal fat to create a paint-like substance.
Processes * Carving: Prehistoric artists would carve stone, bone, and ivory using simple tools such as chisels and hammers. They would often use sand or water to smooth the surface of the object. * Engraving: Engraving involves cutting or scratching a design into a surface. Prehistoric artists would often use sharp stones or bones to engrave intricate designs onto bone or ivory objects. * Modeling: Modeling involves shaping a material such as clay or wax into a three-dimensional form. Prehistoric artists would use their hands or simple tools to shape clay into pottery or figurines. * Painting: Prehistoric artists would mix pigments with water or animal fat to create a paint-like substance. They would then apply the paint to a surface using brushes made from animal hair or plant fibers.
Techniques * Relief: Relief is a sculptural technique where the sculpted elements remain attached to a solid background. Prehistoric artists would often create relief sculptures by carving into stone or bone. * Incision: Incision involves cutting or carving a design into a surface. Prehistoric artists would often use incision to create intricate designs on bone or ivory objects. * Hatching: Hatching involves creating a pattern of parallel lines to create shading or texture. Prehistoric artists would often use hatching in their drawings and engravings. * Stippling: Stippling involves creating a pattern of small dots to create shading or texture. Prehistoric artists would often use stippling in their drawings and engravings.

Theories and Interpretations of Prehistoric Art

Theories of Prehistoric Art

Shamanism Theory * According to this theory, prehistoric art was created by shamans or religious leaders to communicate with the spirit world. * The art was used as a tool for religious and spiritual practices. * The images depicted in the art were believed to have magical powers that could help the shamans in their rituals.
Sympathetic Magic Theory * This theory suggests that prehistoric art was created to control the environment. * The images depicted in the art were believed to have the power to control the animals and the environment. * For example, the images of animals were believed to attract the animals for hunting.
Narrative Theory * According to this theory, prehistoric art was created to tell stories. * The images depicted in the art were used to tell stories of hunting, battles, and other important events. * The art was used as a form of communication to pass on information from one generation to another.

Interpretations of Prehistoric Art

Art for Art's Sake * This interpretation suggests that prehistoric art was created for its own sake. * The art was created for aesthetic purposes and to express the creativity of the artists.
Social and Political Interpretation * This interpretation suggests that prehistoric art was created to express social and political ideas. * The art was used to express the power and status of the individuals and the community.
Psychological Interpretation * This interpretation suggests that prehistoric art was created to express the psychological state of the artists. * The art was used as a form of therapy to express emotions and feelings.

Global Prehistoric Artworks

➼ Camelid Sacrum in the Shape of a Canine

Details * 14,000–7000 B.C.E. * From Tequixquiac, Central Mexico * Located at the National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City, Mexico * Preserved in 1870 in the Valley of Mexico.
Materials * Bone sculpture from a camel-like animal. * The bone has been worked to create the image of a dog or wolf.
Content * Carved to represent a mammal’s skull. * One natural form is used to take the shape of another. * The sacrum is the triangular bone at the base of a spine.
Context * Second skull: A Mesoamerican idea * The sacrum bone symbolizes the soul in some cultures, and for that reason it may have been chosen for this work.

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➼ Anthropomorphic Stele

Details * 4th-millennium B.C.E. * From Arabian Peninsula * Mainly made of sandstone * Preserved in National Museum, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Stele: an upright stone slab used to mark a grave or a site
Form and Content * Anthropomorphic: having characteristics of the human form, although the form itself is not human. * Belted robe from which hangs a double-bladed knife or sword. * Double cords stretch diagonally across body with an awl unifying them.
Function: Religious or burial purpose, perhaps as a grave marker.
Context * One of the earliest known works of art from Arabia. * Found in an area that had extensive ancient trade routes.

➼ Jade Cong

Details * c. 3300–2200 B.C.E. * From Liangzhu, China * Made from a carved jade * Preserved in Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, China * Cong: a tubular object with a circular hole cut into a square-like cross-section
Form * The circular hole is placed within a square. * Abstract designs; the main decoration is a face pattern, perhaps of spirits or deities. * Some have a haunting mask design in each of the four corners—with a bar-shaped mouth, raised oval eyes, sunken round pupils, and two bands that might indicate a headdress—which resembles the motif seen on Liangzhu jewelry.
Materials and Techniques * Jade is a very hard stone, sometimes carved using drills or saws. * The designs on congs may have been produced by rubbing sand. * The jades may have been heated to soften the stone, or ritually burned as part of the burial process.
Context * Jades appear in burials of people of high rank. * Jades are placed in burials around bodies; some are broken, and some show signs of intentional burning. * Jade religious objects are of various sizes and found in tombs, interred with the dead in elaborate rituals. * The Chinese linked jade with the virtues of durability, subtlety, and beauty. * Made in the Neolithic era in China.

➼ The Ambum Stone

Details * c. 1500 B.C.E. * From Ambum Valley, Enga Province, Papua New Guinea * Made from graywacke * Preserved in National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
Form * Composite human/animal figure; perhaps an anteater head and a human body. * Ridgeline runs from nostrils, over the head, between the eyes, and between the shoulders.
Theories * Masked human. * Anteater embryo in a fetal position; anteaters thought of as significant because of their fat deposits. * May have been a pestle or related to tool making. * Perhaps had a ritual purpose; considered sacred; maybe a fertility symbol. * Maybe an embodiment of a spirit from the past, an ancestral spirit, or the Rainbow Serpent.
History * Stone Age work; artists used stone to carve stone. * Found in the Ambum Valley in Papua New Guinea. * When it was “found,” it was being used as a ritual object by the Enga people. * Sold to the Australian National Gallery. * Damaged in 2000 when it was on loan in France; it was dropped and smashed into three pieces and many shards; it has since been restored.

➼ Tlatilco Female Figurine

Details * c. 1200–900 B.C.E. * From Central Mexico, site of Tlatilco * Made out of ceramic * Preserved in Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, New Jersey
Form * Flipper-like arms, huge thighs, pronounced hips, narrow waists. * Unclothed except for jewelry; arms extending from body. * Diminished role of hands and feet. * Female figures show elaborate details of hairstyles, clothing, and body ornaments.
Technique: Made by hand; artists did not use molds.
Function: May have had a shamanistic function
Context and Interpretation * Some show deformities, including a female figure with two noses, two mouths, and three eyes, perhaps signifying a cluster of conjoined or Siamese twins and/or stillborn children. * Bifacial images and congenital defects may express duality. * Found in graves, and may have had a funerary context.

➼ Terra cotta fragment

Details * 1000 B.C.E. * From Lapita, Reef Islands, Solomon Islands * Made from incised terra cotta * Preserved in University of Auckland, New Zealand
Form * Pacific art is characterized by the use of curved stamped patterns: dots, circles, hatching; may have been inspired by patterns on tattoos. * One of the oldest human faces in Oceanic art.
Materials * Lapita culture of the Solomon Islands is known for pottery. * Outlined forms: they used a comb-like tool to stamp designs onto the clay, known as dentate stamping.
Technique * Did not use potter’s wheel. * After pot was incised, a white coral lime was often applied to the surface to make the patterns more pronounced.
Tradition * Some designs found on the pottery are used in modern Polynesian tattoos and tapas.

➼ Apollo 11 Stones

Details * c. 25,500–25,300 B.C.E. * Painted using charcoal on stone, * Preserved in State Museum of Namibia, Windhoek, Namibia
Form * Animal seen in profile, typical of prehistoric painting. * Perhaps a composite animal rather than a particular specimen.
Materials * Done with charcoal.
Context * Some of the world’s oldest works of art, found in Wonderwerk Cave in Namibia. * Several stone fragments found. * Originally brought to the site from elsewhere. * Cave is the site of 100,000 years of human activity.
History * Named after the Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969, the year the cave was discovered.

➼ Great Hall of the Bulls

Details * 15,000–13,000 B.C.E. * From Paleolithic Europe * A rock painting, * Found in Lascaux, France
Content * 650 paintings: most common animals are cows, bulls, horses, and deer.
Form * Bodies seen in profile; frontal or diagonal view of horns, eyes, and hooves; some animals appear pregnant. * Twisted perspective: many horns appear more frontal than the bodies. * Many overlapping figures.
Materials * Natural products were used to make paint: charcoal, iron ore, plants. * Walls were scraped to an even surface; paint colors were bound with animal fat; lamps lighted the interior of the caves. * No brushes have been found. * May have used mats of moss or hair as brushes. * Color could have been blown onto the surface by mouth or through a tube, like a hollow bone.
Context * Animals placed deep inside cave—some hundreds of feet from the entrance. * Evidence still visible of scaffolding erected to get to higher areas of the caves. * Negative handprints: are they signatures? * Caves were not dwellings, as prehistoric people led migratory lives following herds of animals; some evidence exists that people did seek shelter at the mouths of caves.
Theories * A traditional view is that they were painted to ensure a successful hunt. * Ancestral animal worship. * Represents narrative elements in stories or legends. * Shamanism: a religion based on the idea that the forces of nature can be contacted by intermediaries, called shamans, who go into a trance-like state to reach another state of consciousness.
History * Discovered in 1940; opened to the public after World War II. * Closed to the public in 1963 because of damage from human contact. * Replica of the caves opened adjacent to the original.

➼ Running Horned Woman

Details * 6000–4000 B.C.E. * A pigment on rock, * Found in Tassili n’Ajjer, Algeria
Form * Composite view of the body. * Many drawings exist—some are naturalistic, some are abstract, some have Negroid features, and some have Caucasian features. * The female horned figure suggests attendance at a ritual ceremony.
Content * Depicts livestock, wildlife, and humans * Dots may reflect body paint applied for ritual or scarification; white patterns in symmetrical lines may reflect raffia garments.
Context * More than 15,000 drawings and engravings were found at this site. * At one time the area was grasslands; climate changes have turned it into a desert. * The entire site was probably painted by many different groups over large expanses of time.

➼ Beaker with Ibex Motifs

Details * 4200–3500 B.C.E. * From Susa, Iran * Painted terra cotta * Found in Louvre, Paris
Form and Content * Frieze of stylized aquatic birds on top, suggesting a flock of birds wading in a Mesopotamian river valley. * Below are stylized running dogs with long narrow bodies, perhaps hunting dogs. * The main scene shows an ibex with oversized abstract and stylized horns. * Stylized: a schematic, nonrealistic manner of representing the visible world and its contents, abstracted from the way that they appear in nature
Materials and Techniques * Probably made on a potter’s wheel, a technological advance; some suggest instead that it was handmade. * Thin pottery walls.
Context and Interpretation * In the middle of the horns is a clan symbol of family ownership; perhaps the image identifies the deceased as belonging to a particular group or family. * Found near a burial site, but not with human remains. * Found with hundreds of baskets, bowls, and metallic items. * Made in Susa, in southwestern Iran.

➼ Stonehenge

Details * c. 2500–1600 B.C.E. * Made out of sandstone, Neolithic Europe, * Found in Wiltshire, United Kingdom
Technique * Post-and-lintel building; lintels grooved in place by the mortise and tenon system of construction. * Mortise and tenon: a groove cut into stone or wood, called a mortise, that is shaped to receive a tenon, or projection, of the same dimensions * Large megaliths in the center are over 20 feet tall and form a horseshoe surrounding a central flat stone. * A central horseshoe is surrounded by lintel-connected megaliths. * Hundreds of unidentified stones surrounded the monument. * Builders lacked wheels and pulleys. Stones may have been transported on logs or a greased sleigh.
Context * Each stone weighs over 50 tons, reflecting the structure's intended permanence. * Some stones were imported from over 150 miles away, suggesting they were sacred.
History * Perhaps took 1,000 years to build; gradually redeveloped by succeeding generations.
Probably built in three phases: * First Phase: circular ditch 36 feet deep and 360 feet in diameter containing 56 pits called Aubrey Holes, named after John Aubrey who found them in the 18th century. * Today the holes are filled with chalk. * Second Phase: wooden structure, perhaps roofed. * The Aubrey Holes may have been used as cremation burials at this time. * Adult males were buried at these sites, generally, men who did not show a lifetime of hard labor, signifying it was a site for a select group of people. * Third Phase: stone construction.
Tradition * British Isles forests may have inspired wood circles. * Stone circles are still common in Britain, indicating Neolithic popularity.
Theories * As an observatory, it may predict eclipses and be oriented towards the summer and winter solstices. * According to a new theory, elite males were buried at Stonehenge. * An alternative theory suggests it was a healing site.

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