A Paleolithic Bird Figurine from the Lingjing Site, Henan, China

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Carving a figurine requires the ability to mentally visualize a volume in matter and create symmetries in a three-dimensional space. During the Paleolithic, such objects were likely made to be transported, curated, manipulated, and hung on clothing. Thus far, no instances of three-dimensional portable art were documented in East Asia before the Neolithic. We report the discovery of a well-preserved miniature carving of a standing bird from the Lingjing site, Henan, China. Microscopic and µ-CT analyses of the figurine and the study of bone fragments from the same context reveal the object was made of bone blackened by heating and carefully carved with four techniques that left diagnostic traces on its entire surface. An analysis of the site’s research history and stratigraphy as well as 28 14C ages obtained on associated archeological items suggest a Late Paleolithic origin for the carving, with an age estimated to 13,500 cal BP. The carving predates previously known instances from this region by 8,500 years, demonstrates that three-dimensional avian representations were part of East Asian Late Pleistocene cultural repertoires, and identifies technological and stylistic peculiarities distinguishing this newly discovered artwork from previous and contemporary examples found in Western Europe and Siberia.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32538