Indonesia’s 68,000-year-old handprint: the birth of human art?

The faint outline of a hand in a cave in Indonesia’s Sulawesi has been recognised as the world’s oldest known rock art, shattering a long-held scientific theory that human artistic expression first flourished in Ice Age Europe.Dating back at least 67,800 years, the faded stencil was found hiding beneath a more recent chicken sketch in Metanduno cave on Muna Island.Researchers say the finding, which was published in the scientific journal Nature on January 21, proves that ancient humans in Southeast Asia were already capable of reflecting on their existence and leaving intentional marks of meaning behind.Dr Adhi Agus Oktaviana, a rock art specialist from Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN), first spotted the hand stencil in 2015, its faint traces nearly obscured.Scientist Adhi Agus Oktaviana studies handprints on the walls of a cave in Sulawesi, Indonesia. Photo: Maxime Aubert/APFour years later, he collected a sample that scientists at Griffith University in Australia subsequently determined predated all previously known rock paintings by at least 15,000 years.