January 11, 2002
John Yeld
Cape Town

THE INTERNATIONAL archaeological community has been stunned by a find in a cave on the southern African coastline which proves that modern humans were living there about 77 000 years ago.

Until now, the most compelling evidence for cognitive, or thinking, abilities considered a key to modern human behaviour, has been abstract images by the famed cave painters of the Upper Palaeolithic era in Eurasia, dating
back about 35 000 years.

But an international team of researchers led by Christopher Henshilwood, affiliate archaeologist at Iziko-South African Museum in Cape Town, has found complex abstract representations engraved on two pieces of red ochre
at Blombos Cave near Stilbaai, which are twice as old.

Another seven pieces of ochre are still being analysed for possible engravings.

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