(I] Read the following two passages and answer the questions.
資料1
A cave-wall depiction of a pig and buffalo hunt is the world's oldest recorded story,
claim archaeologists who discovered the work on the Indonesian island Sulawesi. The
scientists say the scene is more than 44,000 years old. The 4.5-metre-long panel
features reddish-brown forms that seem to depict human-like figures hunting local
animal species. Previously, rock paintings found in European sites dated to around
14,000 to 21,000 years old were considered to be the world's oldest clearly narrative
artworks. The scientists working on the latest find say that the Indonesian art predates
these.
Such artworks are notoriously difficult to date because they can be made with raw
materials, such as charcoal(注1), which can be much older than the paintings
themselves. But scientists excited the archaeological worid when they reported, in 2014
and 2018, that caves in Sulawesi and Borneo held artworks, including animal paintings,
which were older than 40,000 years.
The panel seems to depict wild pigs found on Sulawesi and a species of small-bodied
buffalo, called an anoa. These appear alongside smaller figures that look human but also
have animal traits such as tails and long noses. In one section, an anoa is surrounded by
several figures holding spears and possibly ropes. The depiction of these animal-human
figures, known in mythology as therianthropes (注 2), suggests that early humans in
Sulawesi had the ability to conceive of things that do not exist in the natural world, claim
2
the researchers. The oldest such example from Europe is a half-lion, half-human ivory
figure from Germany that researchers have estimated to be 40,000 years old-although
Some suggest that it might be significantly younger. A roughly 17,000-year-old painting
of a bison chasinga bird-headed human, from Lascaux Cave in France, is considered to
be one of the earliest depictions of a clear scene in European rock art.
To determine the age of the hunting scene, researchers led by archaeologist
Maxime Aubert, at Griffith University, Australia, analysed calcite (注 3) 'popcorn' that had
built up on the painting. Radioactive uranium in the mineral slowly decays into thorium.
So by measuring the relative levels of different isotopes (往0 of these elements, the
researchers were able to determine that calcite on top of one pig began forming at least
43,900 years ago, and deposits (注 5) on two anoas are older than 40,900 years. The
dating gives scientists clues about the origins of figurative art. "t has always been
assumed that the tradition of figurative painting arose in Europe," says Alistair Pike, an
archaeological scientist at the University of Southampton, UK. "This shows the tradition
does not have its origins in Europe." But he notes that the researchers dated only the
portions of the painting that show animals, so it's possible that the therianthropes were
added later. Aubert says the team did not find calcite samples over the therianthropes.
Aubert thinks the animals and the therianthropes were painted at the same time.
They are of similar colour and weathered in the same way, he notes, and all the other
cave art from the region is from the same time period. Archacologist Bruno David, at
Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, agrees with Aubert's interpretation.
If the entire painting is more than 44,000 years olid, it could mean that early humans
arrived in southeast Asia with the capacity for symbolic representation and storytelling.
David argues. Archaeologists have already found paint palettes and objects such as
eggshells with abstract engravings made by early humans in southern Africa, he adds.
“'s probably only a matter of time before narrative paintings of this, and much older
age, are found in Africa."
(Adapted from Nature, December 11, 2019)
(注1) charcoal 木炭
(注2) therianthrope 獣人
(注3) calcite 方解石
(注4) isotope 同位体
(注5) deposit 付着物
