Ancient handprints on cave walls in Spain found to include children's hands

Bob Yirka is a writer for Phys.org.

A group of researchers from the University of Cambridge and the University of Cantabria have found evidence suggesting that up to 25% of the ancient handprints found on cave walls in Spain were made using children's hands. In their paper published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, Vernica Fernández-Navarro, Diego Garate, and others describe their study of ancient hand prints found in five Spanish caves.

Over the past several decades, hand prints on cave walls have come to represent ancient cave art as much as drawings of animals. Scientists studying handprints and animal drawings agree that they were all done by males in a group. Evidence suggests that up to 25% of all cave hand prints were made using children's hands.

The researchers noted that there was very little mention of the impact or activities of children in ancient societies. They wondered about some of the art on the walls of caves across Europe and in Spain, and they took a closer look at the hand prints.

The researchers found that most of the hand prints were made using a stencil, rather than applying ink to the hand and pressing it against the wall. They found that most of the stenciled hands had been created using a common technique of the time, placing a hand near a wall and blowing at it with a hollow bone or reed. Rather than placing their hands on the wall, most of the prints had been done by holding the hand a little away from the wall, a means for generating a stencil with a slightly 3D look. In replicating the technique with their own hands, they found that a stenciled hand was slightly larger than the hand used to create it. They carefully studied hundreds of the hand prints and used 3D photogrammetric models as references.

They found that up to 25% of the hand prints on the walls in five caves in Spain were of children's hands, some of which could have come from toddlers or even infants. They suggest that cave art was a group activity shared among all members. Some ancient forms of art, left behind as artifacts, may have been done by children.

More information: Verónica Fernández-Navarro et al, Visualizing childhood in Upper Palaeolithic societies: Experimental and archaeological approach to artists' age estimation through cave art hand stencils, Journal of Archaeological Science (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2022.105574 Journal information: Journal of Archaeological Science

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