Page 4 - Jan-Mar 2016

Hello!
CAVES AND EARLY MAN I am Cave
Man.

Cave art has a long history in India, going back to the Palaeolithic
and continuing into the early Medieval period and can be broadly
divided into Prehistoric and Historic.

PICTOGRAPhS AND PETROGLyPhS

Cave art or rock art can be
broadly divided into two Illustration by: Keertana B, VII A, GIIS, Bangalore
categories- pictographs and
petroglyphs.
Pictographs are drawings or
paintings of various things-
animals, man,weapons etc.
done directly on the rock with
Illustration by: Soni Kumari, IX A,
fingers or a brush etc. Sachidanand Gyan Bharti Model School, Ranchi
Petroglyphs include engravings and incisions with stone tools or
wooden sticks made into the cave wall to create different designs
of hunters, animals etc. which were then coloured.

Illustration by: Souvik Karmakar, X E,
PREHISTORIC ART DAV Public School, Sec 14, Faridabad

why wAS CAVE ART IMPORTANT hOw hAS CAVE ART SURVIVED fOR

fOR ThE EARLy MAN? SUCh A LONG TIME?
One has to remember that not all forms of cave art has
archaeologists believe that cave art had ritualistic
purposes, because for the early Man hunting was survived and those that have were found in very dark
an important and a formidable task, as his primitive caves where temperature and humidity was more or
less constant. This is also because of the fact that the
weapons made it difficult for him to subdue wild
beasts. Thus it was believed that once its symbolism early Man deliberately made cave art at places that were
hidden. also the art in these caves was also meant to be
was captured by him, in this case paintings of wild
animals on walls, his task became a lot easier as ritualistic and therefore were done at places which were
such rituals were believed to help the early Man mostly inaccessible.
in his actual hunt.

hOw DID ThE EARLy MAN CREATE hIS PAINTINGS?

based upon the studies conducted by archaeologists, it is generally believed that the first step in
creating a painting is making an outline of the figure on the cave wall with a pointed piece of stone. The
colours were filled later. These were mostly derived from their natural environment, for example charcoal
was used to extract black colour, while brown, red and orange colour was extracted from iron ore. These
were also mixed with plant juices or animal fat or blood to make paints.

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