Amateur archaeologist deciphered the Ice Age writing system: professionals could not understand it for decades - ForumDaily
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Amateur Archaeologist Deciphers Ice Age Writing System: Professionals Couldn't Understand It for Decades

A primitive writing system used by Ice Age hunter-gatherers was discovered by an amateur archaeologist who concluded that 20-year-old marks were a form of a lunar calendar. The edition told in more detail The Guardian.

Photo: IStock

The study suggests that the rock paintings were not only a form of artistic expression, but also used to record complex information about the timing of animal reproductive cycles.

Ben Bacon spent countless hours trying to decipher the "proto-writing" system, which is believed to be at least 10 years older than other similar record keeping systems.

He approached a group of scientists with his theory, and they urged him to follow it, although he says he is "actually a man off the street."

Bacon collaborated with a group that included two professors from Durham University and one from University College London to publish a paper in the Cambridge Archaeological Journal.

Professor Paul Pettit, an archaeologist at Durham University, was "glad he took it seriously" when Bacon contacted him.

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"The results show that Ice Age hunter-gatherers were the first to use a system calendar and markers to record information about major environmental events within that calendar," he said.

Rock carvings of species such as reindeer, fish, and now-extinct aurochs and bison-like cattle have been found throughout Europe. Along with these depictions of sequences of dots and other signs, more than 600 Ice Age depictions have been found on cave walls and portable objects throughout Europe. Archaeologists have long believed that these marks had some meaning, but no one could decipher them.

So the amateur archaeologist decided to do just that - he turned to previous research, as well as images of cave art in the British Library, and looked for repeating patterns. Bacon said it was “surreal” to find out what people said 20 years ago.

Using the birth cycles of equivalent animals today as a guide, the team concluded that the number of markings associated with Ice Age animals were records by the lunar month when they mated. They believe that the inclusion of a Y sign, formed by adding a divergent line to another, signified "birth".

Pettitt remarked: "We can show that these people, who left a legacy of spectacular art in the caves of Lascaux and Altamira, also left early timekeeping records that eventually became common among our species."

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Since signs are considered to record numerical information rather than speech, they are not considered "written" in the sense of the pictographic and cuneiform systems that appeared in Sumer from 3400 BC, but are classified as a protosystem of writing.

Bacon said the work made the people responsible for the drawings feel "suddenly much closer".

“As we delve deeper into their world, we find that these ancient ancestors are much more like us than we previously thought,” he noted.

The findings prompted the team to further investigate the meaning of other markings found on the rock art.

“We hope that revealing more parts of the proto-writing system will allow us to understand what information our ancestors valued,” Bacon concluded.

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