The Pseudodon shell DUB1006-fL or Pseudodon DUB1006-fL (540,000-430,000 BP) is a

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

freshwater

shell Shell may refer to: Architecture and design * Shell (structure), a thin structure ** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses ** Thin-shell structure Science Biology * Seashell, a hard o ...

of '' Pseudodon vondembuschianus trinilensis'' found at Trinil,

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mos ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

. The shell has a

zigzag A zigzag is a pattern made up of small corners at variable angles, though constant within the zigzag, tracing a path between two parallel lines; it can be described as both jagged and fairly regular. In geometry, this pattern is described as ...

engraving supposedly made by '' Homo erectus'', which could be the oldest known anthropogenic engraving in the world.

Description

The shell is a part of an assemblage of fossil freshwater mussel shells, excavated by the

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

paleoanthropologist and

geologist A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually study geology, earth science, or geophysics, althoug ...

Eugène Dubois Marie Eugène François Thomas Dubois (; 28 January 1858 – 16 December 1940) was a Dutch paleoanthropologist and geologist. He earned worldwide fame for his discovery of ''Pithecanthropus erectus'' (later redesignated ''Homo erectus''), or "Java ...

in 1890s from the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was finally confirmed in ...

layer at the Trinil site,

. The assemblage, including the shell DUB1006-fL, is now at the

Naturalis Biodiversity Center Naturalis Biodiversity Center ( nl, Nederlands Centrum voor Biodiversiteit Naturalis) is a national museum of natural history and a research center on biodiversity in Leiden, Netherlands. It was named the European Museum of the Year 2021. ...

Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wi ...

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

. Geometric engravings on the shell DUB1006-fL were discovered by a

biologist A biologist is a scientist who conducts research in biology. Biologists are interested in studying life on Earth, whether it is an individual Cell (biology), cell, a multicellular organism, or a Community (ecology), community of Biological inter ...

Josephine Joordens (then at Leiden University) and her colleagues in 2014. Their analysis suggests that the engravings are made by '' Homo erectus'' between 540,000 and 430,000 BP. The engravings were probably made on a fresh shell specimen using a

shark Sharks are a group of elasmobranch fish characterized by a cartilaginous skeleton, five to seven gill slits on the sides of the head, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the clade Selachi ...

tooth. It is also suggested that all grooves were made by a single individual in a single session with the same tool.

Interpretation

Joordens et al. do not give a direct interpretation of the engravings, but suggest that "engraving abstract patterns was in the realm of

Asian Asian may refer to: * Items from or related to the continent of Asia: ** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia ** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia ** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...

''Homo erectus'' cognition and neuromotor control." In her interview, Joordens says that since the intentions of the person who made the engravings are not known, it is not possible to classify these engravings as art. "It could have been to impress his girlfriend, or to doodle a bit, or to mark the shell as his own property," says Joordens.

Controversy

The main discussion happens around the question of whether the engraving on the shell can be considered as

art Art is a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas. There is no generally agreed definition of wha ...

(which would make it the earliest known artistic expression of

hominids The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the ...

in the world). Commentators of the original study by Joordens et al. suggest their opinions, but do not study the engravings explicitly. Some commentators, similarly to the authors of the study, give a neutral description of the engravings, calling them a "doodle" or "decorative marks". Some other commentators suggest explicitly that these engravings are art. Tsion Avital, a philosopher of art and

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups ...

, makes a distinction between art and

design A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. The verb ''to design' ...

and suggests that the engraving on Pseudodon DUB1006-fL cannot be seen as the former, but can well be the latter. He contests the description of the engraving by Joordens et al. who called it an "abstract pattern", saying that the terms "abstract" and "pattern" "hint obliquely at the possibility that these engravings possess some symbolic significance." "These engravings are in no sense abstract but rather are completely concrete marks," says Avital.

References

{{reflist, refs= {{Cite journal, last1=Joordens, first1=Josephine C. A., last2=d’Errico, first2=Francesco, last3=Wesselingh, first3=Frank P., last4=Munro, first4=Stephen, last5=de Vos, first5=John, last6=Wallinga, first6=Jakob, last7=Ankjærgaard, first7=Christina, last8=Reimann, first8=Tony, last9=Wijbrans, first9=Jan R., last10=Kuiper, first10=Klaudia F., last11=Mücher, first11=Herman J., date=2015, title=Homo erectus at Trinil on Java used shells for tool production and engraving, url=https://www.nature.com/articles/nature13962, journal=Nature, language=en, volume=518, issue=7538, pages=228–231, doi=10.1038/nature13962, pmid=25470048, bibcode=2015Natur.518..228J, s2cid=4461751, issn=1476-4687 {{cite journal , last1=Callaway , first1=Ewen , title=Homo erectus made world's oldest doodle 500,000 years ago , journal=Nature News , doi=10.1038/nature.2014.16477 , url=https://www.nature.com/news/homo-erectus-made-world-s-oldest-doodle-500-000-years-ago-1.16477 , date=2014-12-03, s2cid=164153158 {{Cite news, last=Thompson, first=Helen, title=Zigzags on a Shell From Java Are the Oldest Human Engravings, url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/oldest-engraving-shell-tools-zigzags-art-java-indonesia-humans-180953522/, access-date=2021-04-18, website=Smithsonian Magazine, language=en, date=2014-12-03 {{Cite news, last=Brahic, first=Catherine, title=Shell 'art' made 300,000 years before humans evolved, url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22429983-200-shell-art-made-300000-years-before-humans-evolved/, access-date=2021-04-18, website=New Scientist, language=en-US, date=2014-12-03 {{Cite news, last=Geggel, first=Laura 03, title=540,000-Year-Old Shell Carvings May Be Human Ancestor's Oldest Art, url=https://www.livescience.com/48991-homo-erectus-shell-tools.html, access-date=2021-04-18, website=livescience.com, language=en, date=2014-12-03 {{Cite news, last=Keim, first=Brandon, date=2014-12-04, title=World's Oldest Art Identified in Half-Million-Year-Old Zigzag, url=https://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/article/141203-mussel-shell-oldest-art, access-date=2021-04-18, website=Adventure, language=en {{cite book , last1=Avital , first1=Tsion , title=The Confusion between Art and Design: Brain-tools versus Body-tools , date=2017 , publisher=Vernon Press , url=https://www.hit.ac.il/.upload/staff/Tsion_Avital/Scientists_in_nomans_land.pdf Archaeology of Indonesia Archaeological artifacts Paleolithic Acheulean Indonesian art Prehistoric art Works of unknown authorship Bivalves and humans Molluscs in culture Seashells in art History of East Java

Description

Interpretation

Controversy

See also

References