News Archaeology

Mysterious marks on Ice Age cave art may have been a form of record keeping

The marks might be one of the earliest examples of a coherent notational system

A photo of an ancient cave marking of aurochs (similar to modern cattle) with four dots on the animal's torso.

Analyses of patterns in ancient cave markings suggest that the four dots on this animal’s torso indicate that aurochs (similar to modern cattle) mated in the fourth month after the spring snowmelt.

JoJan/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)

By Anna Gibbs

As far back as roughly 25,000 years ago, Ice Age hunter-gatherers may have jotted down markings to communicate information about the behavior of their prey, a new study finds.

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