I’m currently taking an Archaeology in Pop Culture course, where we dedicated a week to discuss the depictions of neanderthal culture in popular culture and contrasted it to neanderthal’s actual abilities to produce works of art.
Because of movies like The Croods which highlight the differences between modern-day humans and neanderthals, we often hold the preconceived notion that neanderthals are incapable of intellectual activity. I also had no idea that neanderthals created art because these barbaric and, usually, inaccurate representations of neanderthals spur the falsified beliefs that the earliest entities of art were solely homo sapien creations.
However, to understand the full context of art history, we should try to understand the first depictions of art. Recent bone carvings in Unicorn Cave and cave paintings in three caves in Spain proves that neanderthals were capable of producing advanced art for their time.
In 2019, a bone about the size of a chess piece, carved with 10 deep, slanting lines was found in Unicorn Cave. What surprised most was that these marks appeared intentional, like an abstract pattern or decorative design, and it was created at least a thousand years before modern humans arrived.
Three caves in Spain, dating back to over 60,000+ years ago, leaves Neanderthals as the only possible artists for these Spanish caves.
But then again, art is extremely subjective. So, I leave you with one question: Is this actually art?
