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Sexual roles in deep prehistory are among the most intriguing puzzles still to solve. Here the author shows how men and women can be distinguished by scientific measurement in the prints and stencils of the human hand that occur widely in Upper Palaeolithic art. Six hand stencils from four French caves are attributed to four adult females, an adult...
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... full-sized copy of the fish in the museum exhibit measured only 1.35m, but the tail of the copy was truncated by about 5cm, indicating that the published length is accurate. Published photographs of the Spotted Horses mural often show all six hand stencils as well as the fish pictograph, which is superimposed on one of the horses (Figure 1). ...
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Sexual dimorphism (SD) in cross-sectional shape of the femur, especially the proximal femur, may also be related to SD in body shape, that is, a greater pelvic breadth in females. Sexual dimorphism of cross-sectional morphology and strength have been examined in Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic samples, and for regionally limited Neolithic, Bronze...
Preliminary research on hand stencils found in the Upper Paleolithic cave sites of France and Spain showed that sexual dimorphism in human hands is expressed strongly enough to allow empirical determination of the sexes of the individuals who made some of them. Further research increased
the sample of measurable cases from 6 to 32, a large enough s...
Citations
... 2022年Wang 等人 [27] 指出, 该地区至少有7个主要的钙华沉积期, 在 中G1、G2、G3, 后分别称第1组、第2组、第3组) [16,17] . [45,46] . 通过对邱桑手脚印进行形态学研究, 首先可以论 证这些印迹不是人为凿刻而是通过肢体按压上去的. [17] 评 述 其次, 印迹学研究结果表明邱桑温泉遗址的脚印 与现代人类的脚印在解剖学形态相似 [17] . ...
... More recent bioanthropological and medical research has upheld the statement by Peters et al. (2002) concerning a falsely perceived dichotomy in the 2D:4D ratio (Richards et al., 2020;Zheng & Cohn, 2011). Hand size data has been used to sex hand stencils in caves (Snow, 2006(Snow, , 2013 who argued that sexual dimorphism was less apparent in Upper Palaeolithic populations but other research by, for example, Galeta et al. (2014) and Nelson et al. (2017) confirms that although male hands tend to be larger than female hands in every studied population, there remains a significant degree of overlap. Variability also manifests in the curvature of an individual's fingers, and this will distort the relative length differences between fingers (Nelson et al., 2017). ...
... Hand morphology is far from consistent and yet size data is expected to be an exact match, thus following a normative cline, when applied to past populations. Research by Snow (2006Snow ( , 2013 remains singular in finding a high degree of reliability for assigning sex to Upper Palaeolithic hand stencils. The key point is that each region or locale requires its own unique dataset (Snow, 2013). ...
Finger flutings are channels drawn in soft sediments covering walls, floors and ceilings of some limestone caves in Europe and Australia and in some cases date as far back as 50,000 years ago. Initial research focused on why they were made, but more recently, as part of a growing interest in the individual in the past, researchers began asking questions about who made them. This shift in direction has led to claims that by measuring the width of flutings made with the three middle fingers of either hand, archaeologists can infer the ordinal age, sex and individuality of the ‘fluter’. These claims rest on a single dataset created in 2006. In this paper, we undertake the first critical analysis of that dataset and its concomitant methodologies. We argue that sample size, uneven distribution of sex and age within the sample, non-standardised medium, human variability, the lack of comparability between an experimental context and real cave environments and assumptions about demographic modelling effectively negate all previous claims. To sum, we find no substantial evidence for the claims that an age, sex and individual tracing can be revealed by measuring finger flutings as described by Sharpe and Van Gelder (Antiquity 80: 937-947, 2006a; Cambridge Archaeological Journal 16: 281–95, 2006b; Rock Art Research 23: 179–98, 2006c). As a case study, we discuss Koonalda Cave in southern Australia. Koonalda has the largest and most intact display of finger flutings in the world and is also part of a cultural landscape maintained and curated by Mirning people.
... Modern human hand form and function have been thoroughly studied in different fields and with multiple aims, including work/ergonomics [6][7][8][9][10][11] , sports 12,13 , clinical 14,15 , forensic 16,17 and personal identification [18][19][20][21] , biometry [21][22][23] , paleoanthropology, archaeology [24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31] and other fields. ...
... For biological sex 30,32,33 and age 27,30,32,34 estimation from hand morphology, the most common approach has been conventional morphometrics, i.e. the study of form based on linear measurements, angles, ratios, etc 6,8,11,[35][36][37] . Conventional morphometric approaches to archaeological hand stencils have consistently used different linear measurements and indexes (mostly 'Manning Index' 38,39 , which is based on a sexually-based differentiation in the length of the 2nd and 4th digits due to fetal exposure to hormones) to estimate the biological sex 31,40,41 of the individuals who left these images on the cave walls. ...
Hand stencils are a remarkable graphic expression in Prehistoric rock art, dating back to 42 ka BP. Although these stencils provide direct impressions of the artists’ hands, the characterization of their biological profile (i.e., biological sex and age) is very challenging. Previous studies have attempted this analysis with traditional morphometrics (TM), whereas little research has been undertaken using Geometric Morphometrics (GM), a method widely used in other disciplines but only tentatively employed in rock art studies. However, the large variation in relative finger position in archaeological hands poses the question of whether these representations can be examined through GM, or, in contrast, if this creates an unmanageable error in the results. To address this issue, a 2D hand scans sample of 70 living individuals (F = 35; M = 35) has been collected in three standardized positions (n = 210) and digitized with 32 2D conventional landmarks. Results show that the intra-individual distance (mean Procrustes distance between Pos. 1–2 = 0.132; 2–3 = 0.191; 1–3 = 0.292) is larger than the inter-individual distance (mean in 1 = 0.122; 2 = 0.142; 3 = 0.165). Finally, it has been demonstrated that the relative finger positions, as well as the inclusion of all hand parts in the analysis, have an overshadowing effect on other variables potentially involved in the morphometric variability of the hand, such as biological sex.
... These prehistoric images are so well defined that on one of the hands can be seen a thumbnail, and on another, a bracelet can be seen on a wrist. The hands are small, researchers have suggested they belonged to children or women (Fernández-Navarro, Camarós, & Garate, 2022;Snow, 2006). These motifs are at the farthest end of the cave from the original entrance, and are next to a deep drop to an underground river. ...
Music and sound cannot be experienced through writing and numbers. Writing freezes time onto paper; as a time-based medium, sound cannot be heard without temporal motion, and acoustic metrics are silent data. For a complete experience of sound, it needs to engage our bodies. Digital multimedia technologies offer powerful approaches to understanding the acoustics of the past, and this work will explore a number of those affordances. In particular, this work explores the use of apps that illustrate archaeoacoustic effects, set digitally within visual and acoustic archaeological cultures. The ways of immersing audiences through projection, acoustic simulation, field and studio recordings, and musical performance will be discussed. The use of virtual reality (VR) headsets is explored to create a sense of deep-flow and presence amongst audiences, total immersion in an experiential phenomenological understanding of interacting audio and visual fields, as well as setting such results within an appropriate context. This study will examine how acoustics results at caves in Northern Spain, in various phases of Stonehenge, and at Paphos Theatre (all World Heritage Sites) can be explored using VR and multimedia technologies, evaluating the comparative advantages of the use of different technologies. It proposes that such integration of visual and sonic modelling using interactive digital technologies is effective as a non-representational theory approach to compliment empirical studies, allowing understanding that goes beyond numerical analysis and binary dialectics to engage directly with the material of archaeological sites in an embodied manner, and address the real-world complexities of acoustic ecologies and their contexts.
... But a domain of cultural production may be favored by distinct fitness dynamics in different situations. There may be a large element of sexual selection in the production of modern music, art and narratives (Miller, 1999), although that interpretation is contested for Paleolithic art as creators were also female (Snow, 2006). In some cases musical performers extract resources from consumers, so that the manipulation dynamic is the relevant one. ...
Standard approaches to cultural evolution focus on the recipients or consumers. This does not take into account the fitness costs incurred in producing the behaviors or artifacts that become cultural, i.e., widespread in a social group. We argue that cultural evolution models should focus on these fitness costs and benefits of cultural production particularly in the domain of “symbolic” culture. In this approach, cultural products can be considered as a part of the extended phenotype of producers, which can affect the fitness of recipients in a positive way (through cooperation) but also in a detrimental way (through manipulation and exploitation). Taking the producers’ perspective may help explain the specific features of many kinds of cultural products.
... 6.4;Nelson et al., 2006Nelson et al., , 2017Nowell, 2021, pp. 74-76, see table 3.3;Pettitt et al., 2014Pettitt et al., , 2015Rabazo-Rodríguez et al., 2017;Snow, 2006Snow, , 2013, the Americas (e.g., Bahn, 1998;Guichón & Re, 2021;Onetto & Podestá, 2011), Southeast Asia (especially Indonesia, Thailand and parts of China (e.g., see Aubert et al., 2014Aubert et al., , 2018Chazine, 2005;Chazine & Noury, 2006;Oktaviana et al., 2016;Solheim & Gorman, 1964;Standish et al., 2020;Taçon et al., 2016)), Australia (e.g., Gunn. 2006;Hayward et al., 2018;Moore, 1977;Quinnell, 1976;Taçon et al., 2010;Walsh, 1979), New Guinea (e.g., Arifin & Delanghe, 2004;Edwards & Sullivan, 2008;Gabriel & Gorecki, 2014;Röder, 1938;Tsang et al., 2020Tsang et al., , 2021Tsang et al., , 2022 and the greater western Pacific islands (e.g., Ballard, 1992;Rosenfeld, 1988;Sand et al., 2006;Specht, 1979;Wilson, 2002;Wilson & Ballard, 2018). ...
... Over the past century, hand stencils have been growing in interest because they are not only a ubiquitous representation of human artistic behaviour in rock art assemblages but also an undebatable illustration of the presence of humans on the landscape (e.g., Walker et al., 2018). Various studies have focused on the technical aspects of the imagery, such as the hand size and whether the stencil is of a female or male hand (Faurie & Raymond, 2004;Nelson et al., 2006Nelson et al., , 2017Pettitt et al., 2015;Rabazo-Rodríguez et al., 2017;Snow, 2006Snow, , 2013. Some researchers have also attempted to identify the hands of children (e.g., Gunn 2006) and non-humans (e.g., Honoré et al., 2016). ...
Hand stencils directly represent modern humans in landscape settings around the world. Yet their social and cultural contexts are often overlooked due to the lack of ethnography associated with the artwork. This paper explores the hand stencils from Kundumbue and Pundimbung rock art sites, situated in the traditional boundaries of the Auwim people in the East Sepik Province of Papua New Guinea. Combining archaeological rock art analysis with ethnographic knowledge, we demonstrate that the hand stencils are a priority in each clan's place-making practices, around which they construct the community's social narratives. Rock shelters and their rock art also show a form of communal history that is evoked through their production in contemporary settings, in addition to having been a form of esoteric magic in the past. We conclude that hand stencils can have multiple meanings over time and across space as a widespread cultural marker. However, aspects of the identities of individuals, groups and communities who created the now static hand imagery, remain in place.
... Based on the stencilled handprints found in many of the caves in Spain, and the discovery that in women, the 2nd and 4th fingers are the same length, Prof Dean Snow (2006) has determined that 75 per cent of upper Paleolithic artists were women. In talking about the rupestrian art of Africa, Davis (1984) suggests rock art functions as "a medium of communication in three principal contexts: an extended network of ritual acts and beliefs, to out-of-the-ordinary perception and knowledge, and to adaptively significant local information" (abstract). ...
Abstract
The proposal posed in the title of this article requires that we first understand more about consciousness and what is implied by the term “woman’s consciousness”. It also necessitates that we realise the link between AI and the transhumanism movement. These clarifications can then lead us to reflect on what actually is at stake for humanity and the importance of women honouring their inherent way of understanding reality. It also stresses the need for women to stand up and be “fierce” in their role as mothers and guardians of life, not as bullies but as people who deeply care about the Nature of which humanity, including the young, the old, and the infirm, are a part. It also requires we understand that the sacred cycle of women linked to the moon goes far beyond women’s capacity to reproduce biologically. And, finally, it necessitates we comprehend that, for us women, the mystery behind the living universe is not an abstract mystery, but one that is alive, that vibrates through us and is what animates every cell in our body; we are an embodiment of this living mystery.
... Stencilled and imprinted hands are some of the most useful archaeological evidences to be able to approach Upper Palaeolithic artists physicality and, therefore, their study from a palaeodemographic perspective is essential for understanding holistically past societies. Based on the size and shape of hand imprints in the archaeological record, different biometric methods have been proposed to estimate the age and sex (Groenen, 1988;Manhire, 1998;Ripoll et al., 1999a;Guthrie, 2005;Gunn, 2006;Bednarik, 2008;Snow, 2006Snow, , 2013Pettitt et al., 2014;Mackie, 2015;Carden and Blanco, 2016;Rabazo-Rodriguez et al., 2017, Chazine et al., 2021.), height (Manhire, 1998) and laterality (Faurie and Raymond, 2004;Gunn, 2007;Cashmore et al., 2008;Uomini, 2009) of the corresponding individuals ( Fig. 1). ...
This paper presents rock art as a collective action in which different strata of society took part, including children and subadults. Until recent decades archaeology of childhood has not been in the main focus of the archaeological research, much less the participation of those children in the artistic activity. The present study approaches the palaeodemography of artists in the decorated caves through the paleolithic rock art itself. The approximate age of these individuals has been calculated through the biometric analysis of hand stencils in the caves of Fuente del Salín, Castillo, La Garma, Maltravieso and Fuente del Trucho, using 3D photogrammetric models as reference. The results have been compared with a modern reference population in order to assign the Palaeolithic hands to certain age groups. It has been demonstrated the presence of hand stencil motifs belongs to infants, children and juveniles, revealing this stratum's importance in the artistic activity.
... Este parámetro es más difícil de analizar que la edad, debido a la morfología tan similar entre hombres y mujeres, en donde, si no contamos con huesos clave como el cráneo o la pelvis, el solape entre ambos sexos puede llegar al 85% (Jaroslav, 2006;Sierp y Henneberg, 2015). En lo que respecta al tipo de evidencias que estamos analizando, en base al tamaño y forma de las siluetas e improntas de las manos paleolíticas, se han propuesto diferentes metodologías para estimar el sexo de sus correspondientes autores (Flood, 1987: Groennen, 1988Mc Donald, 1995;Guthrie, 2005;Gunn 2006;Snow, 2006Snow, , 2013Chazine y Noury, 2016;Wang et al, 2010;Mackie, 2015;Carden, 2016;Rabazo-Rodriguez et al., 2017). Es importante destacar que, en la mayoría de estos estudios anteriores la metodología ha sido muy variable, ya que las tipometrías han sido tomadas desde imágenes fotográficas bidimensionales, sin una posterior corrección de la deformación ni partiendo de unos parámetros previos. ...
... Por tanto, esa metodología para determinar el sexo no sería útil por sí sola, problema que ya ha sido reconocido por otros autores (Flood, 1987;McDonald, 1995;Gunn, 2006;Galeta et al., 2014). Guthrie, 2005; Gunn, 2006Gunn, , 2007 Snow, 2006Snow, , 2013H) Mackie, 2015; I) Rabazo-Rodriguez et al, 2017. Asimismo, el estudio de los finger flutings también se ha centrado en el análisis del sexo. ...
Volumen que recoge las contribuciones de cerca de un centenar de investigadores de diferentes universidades y centros de investigación en homenaje a Pilar Utrilla Miranda. A lo largo de 28 artículos se ofrece una visión de diferentes temas relacionados con la trayectoria investigadora de la homenajeada, destacando las novedosas aportaciones sobre Paleolítico, Mesolítico, Neolítico y Arte Rupestre.
... Handprints and hand stencils on cave walls, a phenomenon evidenced on multiple continents also hold biological markers that help better identify the individuals who made the art (e.g. Guthrie 2005;Snow 2006;Snow 2013;Cooney Williams and Janik 2018;Onetto and Podestá 2011). Methdologies exploring the morphometrics of handprints and hand stencils and how they relate to age and sex have been developed and refined over the last few decades to distinguish between male and female hands, and adult and juvenile hands (e.g. ...
... Methdologies exploring the morphometrics of handprints and hand stencils and how they relate to age and sex have been developed and refined over the last few decades to distinguish between male and female hands, and adult and juvenile hands (e.g. Guthrie 2005;Snow 2006;Snow 2013). In Gargas and Tibiron caves (France) handprints were compared with experimental examples and were found to have been made by both sexes, with ages ranging from infancy through to adulthood (Groënen, 1988). ...
Theoretical engagement and methodological innovations geared towards identifying the presence and activities of children in archaeological contexts has increased in pace over the last decade. This paper presents a systematic review of the literature pertaining to the archaeology of hunter-gatherer children (H. sapiens). The review summarises methods and results from 86 archaeological publications, and finds a number of research areas that show material culture relating to hunter-gatherer childhood, including children’s playthings and tools, learning to flintknap, and their involvement in the making of marks, art and footprints. The results demonstrate a diversity of evidence from all inhabited continents covering an extensive time frame. Following a thematic synthesis, we further explore the implications of these data for our understanding of the cultural variability and patterning of hunter-gatherer children in the deep past. We discuss possible interpretative pathways that can shed light on children’s learning processes, agency, minds and bodies, use of space, and how they were embedded in social worlds. The paper closes by proposing potential improvements to archaeological and anthropological research that will further progress our understanding of children as active and engaged members of their societies.
