Lesson 32

32

Before History

Art, symbols, and oral traditions were part of human life long before written records. Cave paintings and hand stencils provide evidence of artistic techniques and symbolic thought, while leaving many questions about their original meanings.

Key Ideas

• Cave art (paintings, hand stencils, and abstract symbols) found in caves around the world is some of our clearest evidence of symbolic thinking: the ability to let one thing represent another.
• The major cave art sites, including Chauvet (36,000 ya) and Lascaux (17,000 ya) in France and Altamira in Spain, show sophisticated artistic technique and careful planning, not casual marks.
• Hand stencils appear in caves from France to Argentina to Indonesia, the same impulse across tens of thousands of years and every populated continent.
• Art, storytelling, and shared ritual meaning helped early human communities cooperate, teach, and pass knowledge across generations long before written language.

Spines

• DK's Science as You've Never Seen it Before: N/A
• Visual Timelines: A World of Change
• Art in Context: Prehistoric Art

Vocabulary

• Cave Art: Paintings, engravings, and drawings made on cave walls by prehistoric humans, dating back 40,000 or more years.
• Symbol: A mark, image, or object that represents something else. Using symbols is a sign of abstract thinking.
• Ritual: A set of actions performed with symbolic meaning, helping communities share beliefs and build identity.
• Prehistoric: The period of human history before written records: everything before about 5,000 years ago.
• Symbolic Thinking: The ability to let one thing stand for another: a picture of an animal can represent the hunt.
• Lascaux: A famous cave in France with animal paintings made at least 17,000 years ago, one of the most important prehistoric art sites.
• Oral Tradition: Passing stories, knowledge, and cultural values from one generation to the next through spoken word.

Discussion Questions

1. Why did people make pictures on cave walls long ago?
   Sample Answer: Answers will vary. Scientists have proposed ritual or ceremony, teaching about animals and hunting, recording important hunts or events, communication between groups, and art for its own sake. The honest answer is probably some combination, and probably different at different sites.
2. What do you think a handprint on a wall meant to the person who made it?
   Sample Answer: A handprint says something that words cannot easily say, like presence, individuality, or connection to a place. It may mean "I was here" or "I am part of this group."
3. Why might art and ritual have helped early humans survive?
   Sample Answer: Shared stories, shared symbols, and shared ceremonies build trust, shared identity, and cooperation.
4. The same 32 geometric signs appear in cave art across Europe over tens of thousands of years. What might that suggest about the people who made them?
   Sample Answer: Answers will vary. If the same symbols appear again and again in different places and times, it suggests they were a shared system of meaning rather than individual marks.

Digging Deeper

1. Make Cave Art: Tape brown paper to a wall at an angle or under a table so you have to reach up to paint, like the ceiling of a real cave. Use crayons, chalk, or washable paint. Draw animals you know, things that matter to you, or abstract patterns. Then make a hand stencil: press your hand flat, trace around it, or paint around it with a sponge.
   Sample Answer: Answers will vary.
2. The Handprint Question: You just put your handprint on a wall. Write: what do you think your handprint means? Now imagine a person 36,000 years from now finding it. What would they think you were trying to say? What would you want them to know?
   Sample Answer: Answers will vary. Hand stencils may mean "I was here" or "I am part of this group."
3. Look at Real Cave Art: Search for images of the Chauvet cave paintings (France), the Altamira cave bison (Spain), or the Cueva de las Manos handprints (Argentina). Study the techniques: how did the artists use the shape of the cave wall itself? How do the figures show movement? What tools did they use? What surprises you?
   Sample Answer: Answers will vary. At Chauvet, the lions are shaded and drawn with multiple legs to suggest motion.