Researchers say a series of handprints on a cave wall on the island of Sulawesi, in Indonesia, may be the oldest rock art ever found. The prints were likely made more than 67,000 years ago. Other cave art found in the area dates back only 4,000 years.
Archaeologist Maxime Aubert announced the find in a study published January 21 in the journal Nature. “For us, this discovery is not the end of the story,” Aubert wrote in an email to the Associated Press. “It is an invitation to keep looking.”
Researchers say that, to make the prints, people held their hands against the rock. Pigment was then blown over the hands, leaving outlines. Researchers aren’t sure whether the art was made by humans or by a prehistoric human relative.
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