DARK PLACES

Buraco dos Mouros (C.K.ã 2010)

"So much of the history of rock art studies emanates from the study of Paleolithic rock art in Europe. As noted (...), the abbé Breuil was convinced that making art was a religious activity, so rock art had to have been done by priests and shamans, who would have been male only, because in his experience, only men were priests. Leroi-Gourhan, Guthrie, Onians, and others thought art was made by unters, and in their understanding of world ethnography, only men were unters. Many believe that caves were too deep, dark, and difficult to get into, and so would have been too frightening for women (Russell 1991). As feminist anthropologists have pointed out for decades, the Western scholarly tradition assumes that women remain bound to home, hearth, food preparation, and child rearing for their entire lives. Feminist critics of archaeology have documented the projection into the past of present-day stereotypes of women as passive, uncreative, and subordinate to active, creative men (Watson and Kennedy 1991; Hays-Gilpin 2000d). In fact, women take part in many kinds of ritual activities in many parts of the world, especially after their child-bearing years. Women, especially young women, often hunt small game. In a few hunter-gatherer cultures, such as the Agta of the Philippines, women hunt as often as men do (Estioko-Griffin 1981). Fear of deep, dark places, is likely to be learned and unlearnable, and therefore unlike to be sex-linked (note that today many cavers are women and a woman was first through the discovery hole at Chauvet)."

Kelley A. Hays-Gilpin - Ambiguous Images - Gender and Rock Art (2004, p. 87-88)

Flautas pré-históricas

Segundo a revista Journal of Human Evolution, uma equipa de arqueólogos fez recentemente uma descoberta notável na gruta de Geissenkloesterle, no sul da Alemanha. Liderados por Tholas Higham, da Universidade de Oxford, os investigadores recuperaram da escavação arqueológica aqueles que são os mais antigos instrumentos musicais conhecidos: duas flautas de ossos de ave e marfim de mamute com 42 a 43 mil anos.
A notícia foi hoje publicada na Naturlink - a ligação à natureza.

ART PURPOSES

"What these early paintings reveal is a very close stylistic continuity with the last phases of rock art in this region. This connection is highlighted by the 'X-ray' infill of the bark painting figures - the characteristic motifs used to represent internal organs within the body cavities of animals - which are also common in the rock art. The outline shape of the species represented, and the devisions indicated between certain limb parts, are also features shared between the two media.
The early collections point to the contiguity of painting on the walls of caves used as wet-season shelters.
Kunwinjku today, who have sheltered regularly in both bark houses and rock country caves during their youth, and occasionally still do in the present, describe these two contexts of painting as being equivalent.
(...) Karrnaradj, a senior Kunwinjku man at Oenpelli in 1982, described it this way:


My father painted two red kangaroos in a cave in my country. Before men painted in bark houses and in caves, for children to look and see. To make them happy. When we tell the story they can look.


Kunwinjku indicate that paintings on bark shelters, and on the walls of caves were people lived, were produced in a relatively informal context as opposed to ceremonial art production.They point to the half-complete and inexpert paintings alonside more careful works to show that this informal atmosphere provided the occasion when young artists were 'trained' to paint.
(...) These shelter paintings are described to have four interlinked purposes. The first is to illustrate the public versions of mythical episodes or historical occurences which are 'for fun' and 'to make children happy'. These stories are retold in a fairly relaxed atmosphere for the amusement and education of children as well as for the pleasing decoration of the space. The second purpose is 'practice' for the young artist in completing such illustrations. While the subjects may be outside versions of Ancestral myths, more important ceremonial interpretations could also be attributed to them (...). The third aim of producing motifs such as hand stencils is to personalize the space. This too is carried out in an atmosphere of 'fun' and there are children's hanprints alongside those of the adults in the caves. Spencer recorded a similar explanation for the hand stencils in the caves at Oenpelli in 1912 (1928: 812). Fourthy, these paintings, as well as other more elaborate paintings executed by senior artists, are described as a record or memorial of an individual having visited the site."

Luke Taylor (2007): Seeing the Inside - Bark Painting in Western Arnhem Land (p. 17-19)

CATACLISMO UNIFORMITARISTA :)

No passado sábado (19 de Maio) assisti a uma palestra na qual me “ensinaram” que há 10 mil anos atrás ocorreu um “cataclismo” resultante da queda de um meteorito, que originou uma cratera com 300 km de diâmetro e um tsunami com 500 metros de altura (que passou a 1000 metros em terra); responsável, concomitantemente, pelo degelo de glaciares com 30 km de altura e pela extinção dos elefantes na baixa de Loures! Entretanto, antes da dita sucessão de eventos, era costume esses glaciares no Verão estarem à latitude da Irlanda e no Inverno descerem até aos Pirenéus!! Por sua vez, há 6000 a.C. deu-se o enchimento do Mediterrâneo que até aí estava seco de Itália até, pelos vistos, ao Estreito de Gilbraltar!!! Essa pretensa geo-história não me chocou pela sua inverosimilhança e, menos ainda, por alterar tudo aquilo que aprendi na licenciatura de geologia ou nas minhas amadoras leituras sobre pré-história, afinal a mudança de conceitos é prática corrente em ciência, apenas me deixou algo mal disposto tendo em conta que não estou habituado a “shakes” que originem “misturas” tão poderosas!

Nesse mesmo dia adquiri um livro que, por coincidência (?), também referia que um “cataclysme écologique a entraîné des bouleversements radicaux”, sem identificar as causas do mesmo; claro está, sem falar em quedas de meteoritos e tsunamis associados. Espantoso é ignorar que tal se insere numa sequência de outros eventos similares de glaciações (Biber, Donau, Günz, Mindel e Riss) e de interglaciações que levaram à definição do Quaternário ou Antropozóico… Os factos são certamente melhor explicados à luz dos ciclos de Milankovitch do que por tsunamitos ou outras ausentes "evidências"! A transgressão Flandriana que se seguiu ao final do Würm continua até hoje e, pelos vistos, o próprio aquecimento global de que tanto se fala, por outro lado é curioso que não se vislumbre a “extinção em massa” que está a ocorrer agora mesmo “debaixo dos nossos olhos”! É tudo uma questão de ritmo, melhor seria dizer de tempo: de facto processou-se (e ainda se está a processar) um “cataclismo”, diremos uniformitarista :)

Já agora, publico aqui um pequeno “vídeo” sobre o Mesolítico como época de transição (entre o Paleolítico e o Neolítico), para uma nova maneira de entender o mundo; não como um período pós-traumático mas como uma nova “janela” de oportunidades evolutivas.

Tubo de Ensaio...

A "galinhola dos ovos d'ouro" deu que falar no Tubo de Ensaio :) "Se uma pessoa andar com um aparelho da via verde na testa já pode andar? (...) Mas isto anda tudo maluco ou é só impressão?..."