News from the Vogelherd Cave

[Jacques Cinq-Mars]

The following is about exciting new finds of mobiliary art at the Vogelherd Cave:

CLICK HERE

Jacques

[aggsbach]

Here is another picture of the mamut found at vogelherd.  The first figurines were found in the 30ies, where G. Riek excavated the large cave with thick strata from the mousterien up to the magdalenien in only three months. Allmost nothing is known about the context of the first 10 ivory figurines. The only thing for shure is that the were all found in the Aurignacian layers .

[trehinp]

Here is another picture of the mamut found at vogelherd.  The first figurines were found in the 30ies, where G. Riek excavated the large cave with thick strata from the mousterien up to the magdalenien in only three months. Allmost nothing is known about the context of the first 10 ivory figurines. The only thing for shure is that the were all found in the Aurignacian layers .

Dear Jacques and Aggbach,

Whao!!!

Two important news in a few days… First the Qurta Palaeolithic engraving and now this new Vogelherd mammoth figurine...

In both cases the dating of these remains the crucial element. in both of these discoveries

In the case of Vogelherd while the press seems to indicate a 35 K year BP date, Aggbach is rightfully giving a more cautious view about dating this figurine.

Vogelherd had previously given us other artifacts such as a beautiful ivory horse. This horse was dated of even older times "Dating using modern physical methods, like  C14-dating, dated the ivory carvings to nearly 40.000 years before present." Click here for more

Of course, as usual, journalists try to make their news as eye catching as they can...

It remains that apparently, and taking into account the fact that the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence, figurines seem to have preceded 2 D representation art during the Aurignacian. Chauvet paintings and drawings, the oldest known figurative 2 D naturalistic art known so far, is "only" 32 K yeaks BP...

This poses an interesting question about the evolution of prehistoric art and the cognitive mechanisms that enable a representation of reality, first as a reduce 3 D model, then into the more abstract 2D representation. The later is a very complex brain process demanding a projection of an object perception in space onto a flat surface.

I hope that we will have soon more about this Vogelherd  ivory mammoth and its precise dating.

Yours sincerely.

Paul

[Löwenmensch]

In the case of Vogelherd while the press seems to indicate a 35 K year BP date, Aggbach is rightfully giving a more cautious view about dating this figurine.

Vogelherd had previously given us other artifacts such as a beautiful ivory horse. This horse was dated of even older times "Dating using modern physical methods, like  C14-dating, dated the ivory carvings to nearly 40.000 years before present." Click here for more

Of course, as usual, journalists try to make their news as eye catching as they can...

It remains that apparently, and taking into account the fact that the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence, figurines seem to have preceded 2 D representation art during the Aurignacian. Chauvet paintings and drawings, the oldest known figurative 2 D naturalistic art known so far, is "only" 32 K yeaks BP...

Paul
I would also agree with Aggsbach in urging caution as to the date of these new figurines. A date of 40,000 BP is surely excessive and is not supported by any published dates for Vogelherd - even a date of 35,000 is probably a little on the high side.  A number of C14 dates for the Aurignacian layers (layers V, V/IV and IV) of Vogelherd were published a couple of years back:

Conard, N. J. and M. Bolus. 2003. Radiocarbon Dating the Appearance of Modern Humans and Timing of Cultural Innovations in Europe: New Results and new Challenges. Journal of Human Evolution 44: 333-373. (freely downloadable from N. Conard's personal homepage at the University of Tübingen HERE).

Although the available dates from layer V include 1 date of ca. 35,000 BP (uncal.) the main cluster of 9 dates lies between ca. 30 and 33,000 which would make this layer the same age as the other figurative art-bearing Aurignacien layers in the Swabian caves, i.e. the 'upper Aurigancian' layer II from Geißenklösterle and the Aurignacien/Gravettien interface in the Hohle Fels in the Ach valley  and the Aurignacien layer from Hohlenstein-Stadel in the Lone valley where the dates in association with the famous "Löwenmensch" figurine also cluster around ca. 31-33,000  BP (uncal.). So that all in all, the age of the Swabian figurative art is at current levels of chronological resolution largely if not wholly 'contemporary' with the Chauvet paintings, which I find makes it all the more puzzling. Its also worth noting that all the Aurignacian layers of Vogelherd have all yielded a number of younger C14 dates (ca. 27-26,000 BP and younger) suggesting that  these layers also contain a younger component.

The practice of selecting only the oldest C14 date when discussing the age of a site/layer shows that journalists are not the only ones who endeavour to make their news as eye catching as possible.;-)

Best
Keith

P.S. The dates for Hohlenstein-Stadel are in the Conard/Bolus JHE article cited above. On the age of layer II of Geißenklösterle you might want to look at Teyssandier, N., M. Bolus and N. J. Conard. 2006. The Early Aurignacian in central Europe and its place in a European perspective. In Toward a Definition of the Aurignacian. Edited by O. Bar-Yosef and J. Zilhao. Trabalhos de Arcqueologia 45. 241-256 (also available from N.Conard's personal site HERE) and N. Teyssandier (2005) "New Perspectives on the Origins of the Aurignacien" (in German) available HERE
For the age of the animal figurines from Hohle Fels see: Conard, N. J. 2003. Paleolithic ivory sculptures from southwestern Germany and the origins of figurative art. Nature 426: 830-832. (again available from N.Conard's personal site HERE).

[lagarvelho]

Jacques, Keith, Paul, and all:

I can't really add too much here.  Except that, in a way, it kind of reminds me of the Berekhat Ram figurine.  That is, the mammoth seems to have been made with a minimum of carving.  It kind of looks to me like the artist simply took the natural curve of the mammoth tusk and turned the piece into the mammoth that was "already there".  Some sculptors do similar things even today.
Anne G

[trehinp]

Thanks for these excellent references Keith, they are very helpful in my research. I completely agree that we should be very careful with regard to the dates of all these figurines. And as I said in my previous message, it may very well be that some 2 D representations were made earlier, but so far haven't been yet discovered.

However, in the present state of information, it seems that carved figurine preceded 2 D representations of animals.

Actually, Anne's remark gives a very good rationale for why this may have been so. Finding a piece of stone that has already the vague shape of an animal only requires that the artist first recognise it as such and then amplifies the existing features to refine the representation.

When looking at that Vogelherd mammoth, I had somewhat had a similar impression as that which Anne expressed in her post even thought the work on the mammoth figurine seem to have been a lot more elaborated than that on the Berekat Ram figurine. Note also that this Berekat Ram figurine has probably been the work of a predecessor of AMM, while the Vogelherd mammoth was most likely done by an AMM.

The use of existing natural shapes very often persisted in 2 D animal representations on cave walls. Nick Humphrey and I have made a connection between this characteristic of using existing shapes ins cave walls and the exceptional ability of individuals with autism at identifying “imbedded figures”, a capability several times documented since the mid 90s, see a more recent paper for a complete analysis of these remarkable visual capabilities: “Cognitive mechanisms, specificity and neural underpinnings of visuospatial peaks in autism” Click here for paper.

But this takes us a bit far from the Vogelherd mammoth…

Yours sincerely.

Paul

[lagarvelho]

Paul:

The chances are that the mammoth figurine *was* probably made by "modern" humans, but I am under the impression that there are no "diagnostic" tools or fossils at Vogelherd --- though I may be quite wrong.  In any case, I also admit that yes, the mammoth figurine is more "elaborated" in some ways than Berekhat Ram, but I think whoever made the Berekhat Ram figurine and whoever made this mammoth carving, probably were thinking along rather similar lines. 
Anne G

[Jacques Cinq-Mars]

Jacques, Keith, Paul, and all:

I can't really add too much here.  Except that, in a way, it kind of reminds me of the Berekhat Ram figurine.  That is, the mammoth seems to have been made with a minimum of carving.  It kind of looks to me like the artist simply took the natural curve of the mammoth tusk and turned the piece into the mammoth that was "already there".  Some sculptors do similar things even today.
Anne G

Well, Anne, you may be a "resident wolf expert" and a writer, but you're certainly not a sculptor. The Berekhat Ram figurine is, at the very best, a slightly and quickly modified, weird looking pebble. The new Vogelherd little mammoth we have been presented with is likely to be the result of many hours/days of work on the part someone who knew how to carve mammoth tusk ivory, a material that is very difficult to deal with, especially with stone tools. I know, I have tried it, and, believe me, it takes a lot of time, patience, and, in order to arrive at such a beautiful result (this new little mammoth), it requires quite a bit of artistic talent on the part of someone who had a keen visual appreciation of the animal world he or she had to deal with. Nothing simple here and this is clearly demonstrated by the entire Vogelherd collection.

More technically, it is almost certain that the artist didn’t use the natural curvature of the tusk, as you suggest. What is likely to have been used is a small, somewhat thin and flat flake obtained, by percussion, from a relatively fresh mammoth tusk. – By the way, flaking fresh ivory is relatively easy to do. --Such a blank would then have been carefully shaped by using methods and techniques that are still used by present day sculptors. The big difference, here, being that while I have access to modern technology (my Dremel, for example), the Vogelherd artist(s) had to work with stone tools of various kinds. A very slow process indeed, one which is well demonstrated by ethnographic examples. But then, contrary to us, these people were not in a rush.

Jacques

[lagarvelho]

Jacques:

Well, you will notice I have never claimed to be a sculptor.  I was really discouraged from doing *any* kind of "art" as a kid, because some teacher apparently didn't think I was "good enough".  So you "have" me there.  And I hope you noticed that I wasn't saying that the Berekhat Ram sculpture was anything "like" the Vogelherd mammoth one; only that two very different "somebodies" in two very different places and times, saw possibilities in the materials they used to create their respective objects.  I certainly don't know anything ab out carving in ivory, or volcanic rock, for that matter, but the processes that "saw" mammoths or human figures, or whatever, in these to objects, may well have been quite similar, though separated in time.  That was my only point.  And now I'll shut up and let the "experts" wrangle about it.
Anne G

[aggsbach]

Dear all,

Regarding the context of the new findings it is now clear that they are coming from the backdirt of Riecks exavations. Interestingly only 10% of this backdirt was screened up to now so we can hope for new "sensations" and for AMS datings. I am sure that we will hear about such a project in the near future...

Johannes

[trehinp]

Dear all,

Regarding the context of the new findings it is now clear that they are coming from the backdirt of Riecks exavations. Interestingly only 10% of this backdirt was screened up to now so we can hope for new "sensations" and for AMS datings. I am sure that we will hear about such a project in the near future...

Johannes

Thanks Johannes,

I just went onto Google and found two articles that give some additionnal details about this astonishing find. These articles give some general background on this "re-discovery" of art pieces. In particular, I find interesting the picture that shows the mammoth sculpture still lying in the dirt... It took good eyes to distinguish it from other stones...

Article available on 35,000-Year-Old Mammoth Sculpture Found in Germany. By Angel (SPIEGEL ONLINE)

Thursday, June 28, 2007, Mammoth Figurine Click here on UPDATE for a full story.

Shows how much information was probably lost in early archeaologic excavations... We can but approve the wise decision to leave some parts of modern excavations untouched in order to allow some future research with more advanced exploration techniques and tools.

Yours sincerely.

Paul