The First Signs: Unlocking the Mysteries of the World's Oldest Symbols

by Genevieve von Petzinger

One of the most significant works on our evolutionary ancestry since Richard Leakey’s paradigm-shattering Origins, The First Signs is the first-ever exploration of the little-known geometric images that accompany most cave art around the world—the first indications of symbolic meaning, intelligence, and language.

Imagine yourself as a caveman or woman. The place: Europe. The time: 25,000 years ago, the last Ice Age. In reality, you live in an open-air tent or a bone hut. But you also belong to a rich culture that creates art. In and around your cave paintings are handprints and dots, x’s and triangles, parallel lines and spirals. Your people know what they mean. You also use them on tools and jewelry. And then you vanish—and with you, their meanings.

Join renowned archaeologist Genevieve von Petzinger on an Indiana Jones-worthy adventure from the open-air rock art sites of northern Portugal to the dark depths of a remote cave in Spain that can only be reached by sliding face-first through the mud. Von Petzinger looks past the beautiful horses, powerful bison, graceful ibex, and faceless humans in the ancient paintings. Instead, she’s obsessed with the abstract geometric images that accompany them, the terse symbols that appear more often than any other kinds of figures—signs that have never really been studied or explained until now.

Part travel journal, part popular science, part personal narrative, von Petzinger’s groundbreaking book starts to crack the code on the first form of graphic communication. It’s in her blood, as this talented scientist’s grandmother served as a code-breaker at Bletchley. Discernible patterns emerge that point to abstract thought and expression, and for the first time, we can begin to understand the changes that might have been happening inside the minds of our Ice Age ancestors—offering a glimpse of when they became us.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Anthropology, Science, Art, Archaeology, Audiobook

307 pages, Hardcover

First published March 29, 2016

Reviews

[Todd Stockslager · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review title: Over promised, under delivered

A better subtitle for this book might be: "Unlocking the mysteries of how subtitles mislead and why." It's not that Von Petzinger has written poorly, but she was unable to deliver on the unrealistic and untrue promise of the subtitle. I certainly picked up the book from my library's new book shelf based on the promise of the mystery solved, and was underwhelmed by the reality of the undelivered promise.

So, context: The first signs are geometric symbols that are often part of Ice Age (10,000 + years ago) cave art wall paintings, which are better known for representations of large mammals (mammoths, bison, horses, deer) and hand prints in red and black paint. Von Petzinger was intrigued by the symbols, and wondered if they were common across the hundreds (350+ known in Europe and more still being found) of these sites and if patterns of usage emerged that might reveal meaning. So she scoured the literature and conducted her own explorations to create a database of the types of symbols and their locations, eventually identifying 32 symbols like cruciforms (crosses), dots, lines, ovals, triangles, and zigzags that appeared in multiple places.

Von Petzinger spends the larger part of her book describing her intellectual and geographic journey to this point, and it is an interesting tale--but in the back of my mind I'm waiting for mysteries to be unlocked. What do these symbols mean? Are they language? When she finally arrives at the point of that discussion over half way through the book I learned what I had already expected: the mystery would not be solved, not because Von Petzinger wasn't a good writer or for lack of knowledge or research. Far from it. What she has done is start to gather the data and ask the right questions, which in itself is an interesting journey, but a subtitle that reads "gathering the data and asking the right questions" isn't likely to make any book fly off the shelves no matter how well written.

Knowing that authors often have no control over their book titles as published, I have to wonder if Von Petzinger argued for a different subtitle. She certainly doesn't write like a sensationalist popular nonfiction writer, more like an earnest teacher eager to show her class the journey to the knowledge she is revealing so the class can really grasp the subject and want to learn more. She never oversells her findings and theories, in fact backs away from some potential inferences because the data can't prove them (unlike some science writers might do for a good subtitle!).

So I wouldn't recommend readers to stay away from The First signs, but rather to read it focused on the journey to and through the data and the theories that Von Petzinger is formulating to organize it. Read The First signs, then look for the followup, hopefully in a few short years, after she is able to gather more data, refine her theories, and have confidence that the data enables them to really unlock the mysteries.

[Wanda Pedersen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been fascinated with cave art since I was about 11 or 12 years old. I blame Children’s Digest. I don’t know who started my subscription to that periodical, but it started quite an assortment of interests which I still read about whenever possible. I distinctly remember a story about a young girl who fell in a hole in Spain and accidentally discovered the Altimira cave system, with its profusion of cave paintings.

So imagine my frenzied fangirl squee-ing when I discovered that one of the leading researchers into the meaning of the abstract & geometrical cave paintings & engravings is a woman and a Canadian. Colour me impressed. And she’s young—there will be more to come from this researcher.

Studying the symbols in cave art seems to be a field whose time has come. This book is partially a travelogue, detailing many of the caves that the author has explored and the symbols recorded. Now that computers are up to the task of keeping track of age, place and position of each symbol, patterns can be discerned and intriguing theories can be concocted. The author is careful to tell us that she hasn’t “translated” these signs yet, but progress is being made. I think it is incredible that there are only 32 basic signs used and that they show pattern and purpose.

One of her most interesting theories is that this “vocabulary” of symbols came with the first humans to Europe and wasn’t invented on the spot. Researchers must turn their eyes back to Africa to see if the beginnings of this tradition can be sussed out.

Also of note (although disappointing to me personally), is that these symbols are probably not entoptic phenomena (visual effects that have their genesis in the eye with no outside stimulation). I’ve seen entoptic effects during visual migraines and they are frightening until you realize what they are. They are flashing arrows, zigzags, circles, Xs, etc. that (for me anyway) were produced when my neck muscles clenched so tightly that input to the optic nerve was cut off. Not only did I think I was going blind, but I was seeing neon-flashing symbols! An earlier theory had postulated that cave artists were merely transcribing their own entoptic symbols from either the sensory deprivation of long, dark cave meditations or from drug-induced trances. The statistics just don’t support this interpretation, however, as the symbols aren’t evenly spread. Unless these cave artists just ignored some symbols, they should all be represented.

A very enjoyable read, clearly written and accessible to those of us who haven’t been keeping up with the research in the field. Now, more than ever, seeing some original cave art is on my bucket list.

[Iset · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have to admit I picked this book up under the totally unfounded assumption that it would be about the Neolithic Vinca symbols. For the uninitiated, the Vinca culture is a society from the Balkans that flourished c. 5700 – 4800 BCE, which left behind mysterious symbols on their artefacts that could well be the world’s first writing system; a good two thousand or so years before the earliest examples of Egyptian hieroglyphs or Sumerian cuneiform.

But in actual fact Von Petzinger goes way beyond this to the Upper Palaeolithic (c. 50,000 – 10,000 BCE), examining the mass of material from Europe’s Ice Age caves, rock art, and incised portable objects; specifically, the mysterious geometric signs. This is far beyond what I would have expected, and it’s fair to say it’s a challenge and then some, considering the languages are lost (even Proto-Indo-European takes us back only as far as 4500 BCE). So, the big question – is it a writing system? Well… no. After tireless cataloguing and data analysis, Von Petzinger clearly states that we are not yet at a writing system with these signs. For starters, the limited number of signs and the relative lack of complex combinations couldn’t possibly render all the permutations of a spoken language. More likely, the symbols communicate limited concepts to the group that created them, but do not represent language.

That disappointment out of the way, I’m impressed with Von Petzinger’s work. Not only is the book clearly and informatively written, but her quality as a researcher shows. It’s considered the mark of a good and rigorous piece of academia to examine, acknowledge, and deconstruct alternative hypotheses. This allows the reader to make up their mind independently, consult other interpretations, and weigh the arguments for why this hypothesis may be more accurate than others. Personally, I think Von Petzinger makes a good case for why the symbols should not be interpreted as either entoptic, shamanic art or binary male/female symbolism. The former simply isn’t supported by the forms and instances of the signs, which rarely align with known entoptic imagery, and the latter proposition seems to rely far too heavily on late 20th century interpretative bias with no evidence to confirm that the art is divided in this way at all.

Von Petzinger also gains big points, at least in my book, for siding with palaeogeneticist Stephen Oppenheimer and arguing against the ‘creative explosion’. The ‘creative explosion’ is the idea by some academics that the wondrous cave art in Europe from c. 50,000 BCE onwards must have come about by some change in our brains, society, or other development – they use this notion to explain the impressive artwork and the apparent lack of such striking art before that date and elsewhere in the world. Personally, I’ve always seriously doubted the existence of a ‘creative explosion’ since anatomically we are the same as the Homo sapiens that evolved in Africa c. 200,000 BCE, and so little exploration and excavation has been done in other Stone Age sites compared to Europe that it seems eminently plausible to suggest that such discoveries are still forthcoming. Oppenheimer’s Out of Eden notes that the ‘creative explosion’ hypothesis makes no sense genetically because a gene switching on is not a prerequisite to our creative expression, and the proposition would rely on such genes somehow spreading back into Africa and across the rest of the world in order for anyone else to be capable of such extraordinary artistic outpourings – which of course is absurd and not the case at all. Von Petzinger directly examines some of the sites outside Europe and dating to earlier than 50,000 BCE to demonstrate convincingly that people had a well-developed sense of symbolic thought and creative expression long before Homo sapiens ever reached Europe.

I would recommend this book to both beginners and academics alike. It’s of genuine interest to me as the first collective analysis attempted of these signs, and thus brings something distinctly new and worthwhile to the field, whilst Von Petzinger’s writing style is accessible and she clearly explains to beginners how the scientific techniques used work. I would therefore deem it suitable for both.

8 out of 10

[Emily Regier · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are even .5% interested in cave art, this work will hook you from the very start. She writes with such casual intellect, almost like she's telling you about her research over coffee on a Tuesday. By the end of the book, I felt this weird sense of pride for this woman I don't even know and the work she's done. She's transcending colleagues in her field and isn't daunted by the incredible challenge her work actually represents. I hope to see more work from her in the future.

[Mary Soderstrom · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an extremely important book about how humans developed in our far distant past. Told in an engaging, yet authoritative way, it probably is the most thought-provoking book I've read in months.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm not sure on the rating of this one. It was a real drag for me to get through, but I think that was due to what else was going on in my life at the time. I do feel like she should have given the relevance of the signs in the first or second chapter instead of speaking about it in the last half of the book. It would have helped the book overall to understand a lot of what she was saying early on.
That being said, the ideas and theories that she presents boggle the mind. Or at least mine. As uneducated in the whole 'ancient man' time as I was I just had pop culture to go by, but what she sets out shows the ancient man as just as good at thinking (in different ways) as we are. It's fascinating to think about.
So I'm not sure on the rating. we'll sit it at 3 for now. This is a good example of why I hate star ratings so much.

[Kaitlyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the stories and learnings in this book! If you're into prehistory, early humans or cave art this is definitely a great overview of much of the field. My only issue was that after all this setup and literature review, Von Petzinger's thesis seemed a bit rushed at the end. I walked away asking "What was her main point again??". I'll continue to look out for her work, she is a great communicator of this fascinating area.

[Jacques Coulardeau · Rating 4 out of 5]

THIS BOOK IS DANGEROUSLY LIMITED

Genevieve von Petzinger is young for sure and she has just finished her Ph.D., but she is connected to National Geographic in their Paleoanthropology department, which is supposed to be a good affiliation. You will surely be interested in many of the information she gathered about rock art and the personal research she did on collecting all geometric or iconic signs present in Homo Sapiens caves in Europe. But the book is not up to the research in the field of the last ten or fifteen years, at times even more.

First of all, her locking her personal research onto Europe is of course very dubious and definitely unacceptable in our global world. Then her coverage of Africa is only collecting information about what others have done, and yet her only one-time mention of Sally McBrearty is very strange because Sally McBrearty spoke very loudly against two myths in this field of research. First she rejected the idea of a Neolithic agricultural revolution for one main reason: it took a long time and personally I will amplify what she said and published and add that Homo Sapiens, particularly when he started migrating out of BLACK Africa, had to take care, the very first form of cultivation, of the natural garden to make sure he was able to survive and expand in his various new environments. Their food has been identified from research on their teeth and it shows an extremely varied food and what’s more Neanderthals shows the same phenomenon, though maybe at a less developed level. We do not know about Denisovans.

The second thing Sally McBrearty was very critical of is the idea of a cognitive revolution somewhere around 50,000 BCE, and the connection some insist on about a possible genetic change, mutations at the time and particularly the FOXP2 gene. I have amplified this approach and I just ask a simple question: what genetic mutations were naturally selected to enable Homo Sapiens to become a bipedal long distance fast runner since his leaving the forest and his coming down into the savanna required that evolution? And I found out that all the elements these cognitive revolutionaries are putting on the table are all necessary genetic mutations for Homo Sapiens to become that bipedal long distance fast runner which was absolutely indispensable if he wanted to survive in the savanna.

The collateral side effect of these mutations is that Homo Sapiens was able to multiply the vowels he could utter and the consonants he could articulate. He could then develop human articulated language that counts three articulations. The first one based on the rotation of vowels and consonants was not possessed by monkeys but we do not know whether Neanderthals and Denisovans had it and if the common ancestors of these two Hominins species plus Homo Sapiens had also developed this rotation of vowels and consonants, this first articulation. I believe they had because they needed a full communicational system, hence an articulated language, even with only one articulation and not the three of our languages, to be able to plan, organize, control and guide the migrations they all were engaged in. The common ancestors to the Middle East and to Central Asia-Mongolia-Siberia where Neanderthals and Denisovans were to evolve, and of course Neanderthals who migrated from the Middle East to the whole of Europe and Denisovans who also migrated from Central Asia to a vast zone in Asia, though their presence in Asia is far from being fully documented.

But Genevieve von Petzinger is short on a few other subjects. She does not study the THREE basic migrations out of BLACK Africa and thus she misses the linguistic problem of the three migrations: Semitic languages first, isolating languages second, and agglutinative and synthetic-analytical languages third. She is so ignorant on this subject that she does not know about the vast research of Theo Vennemann who proved, I repeat proved, Old Homo Sapiens in Europe, the Homo Sapiens of the Ice Age that von Petzinger is considering, spoke a set of Turkic agglutinative languages and nothing else. She neglects the fact that a great number of rivers and geographical areas are still using names that can be traced to Basque or Turkish, hence to Turkic roots. It is these people who painted the caves in Europe.

If she had opened her interest to Indonesia (Sulawesi), to Asia in general, to the Americas and to Africa, she would have found out that rock art is in no way European and it might even be older in some other continents. The author should check the site of the Bradshaw Foundation and she would be able to open up her approach to the whole world. But Sulawesi in Indonesia only would have provided her with the idea that most hands in these caves are female hands and that would have helped her to avoid her minimization of the role of women that she shifts from 75% to nothing but equal, from a 3 to 1 dominance to an equal contribution. This pushing aside of women’s role in these rock art paintings helps the author NOT TO CONSIDER the basic and vital (meaning survival) division of labor of women in Ice Age societies and probably in all Homo Sapiens societies till their emergence 300,000 BCE, that made women the central group in their societies that could 1- be clear about the rejection of inbreeding (a natural characteristic common to at least all mammals); 2- be clear on the role of women in delivering and raising the necessary children who will assume the survival of the community, of the species and their expansion; 3- the spiritual role women played in these societies.

Without falling into the Babel Biblical ranting and raving of some (like Chris Hegg) about the real existence of one unique language before Babel and its tower, I must admit that Genevieve von Petzinger did waste a lot of time about transferring the San hunter-gatherer community in South Africa today and their shamanistic practice, reinforced by the entoptic universal sign theory that is at least debatable, onto the Homo Sapiens communities of Europe during the Ice Age, to come to the conclusion that we cannot conclude these Homo Sapiens had any kind of shamanistic practice. When you come to such a conclusion in your research it is good to drop the research itself and look for another approach.

The other approach is in de Saussure and his theory of the linguistic sign. For Genevieve von Petzinger, in spite of chapter 12 that is purely superficially unthought-through linguistic amateurish prose, Homo Sapiens is mainly MUTE, which he was not. He had a fully developed communicational tool called language that had three deep articulations in this particular case in Europe and it is obvious – meaning absolutely unavoidable and inescapable – that the geometric and maybe iconic signs in the caves along with the hands and all the paintings corresponded to a “word” or “discursive linguistic entity” that had an oral signifier and a semantic signified (meaning) and that Homo Sapiens superimposed onto this linguistic sign a pictographic or geometric sign that was, in fact, a visual signifying superimposed onto the dual linguistic sign. We do not know what these signs mean because we do not know what linguistic signs are behind, and we might never know, but it is not scientifically acceptable to transfer a modern world shamanistic practice onto another practice that is at least 45,000 years older. Such retrospective transfer is a methodological mistake that disqualifies eventual conclusions.

Luckily Genevieve von Petzinger herself concludes that is worth nothing, that no shamanism can be proved. So why on earth did she write and published all these pages on something that is worth nothing? I am in the process of publishing a much longer study on this book because it is dangerously misleading for younger researchers, or a younger audience, who may let themselves be lured by such pages and chapters.

Dr. Jacques COULARDEAU

[Anna Wysocka · Rating 5 out of 5]

Potwierdzam, że to fajna lektura dla osób, które wcześniej tematami prahistorycznymi się nie interesowały, albo, jak ja, interesują się "z doskoku".
Przede wszystkim mnóstwo jest w tej książce przykładów, jak bardzo "nowoczesną" dziedziną nauki jest archeologia, jak wiele zmieniają w niej zdobycze technologiczne ostatnich, powiedzmy, dwudziestu lat. Precyzyjniejsze metody datowania potrafią nieźle namieszać w dotychczasowych hipotezach, a dzięki specjalistycznemu sprzętowi optycznemu można zbadać materiały niewidoczne ludzkim okiem.
Najciekawsze było dla mnie to, co sobie jakoś mało dotychczas uświadamiałam - że badania naukowe w XX wieku miały swoje "mody", czy "trendy". Taką modą był rzecz jasna europocenryzm (przekonanie, że może i człowiek pochodzi z Afryki, ale to w Europie nastąpiła rewolucja twórczego myślenia) - Petzinger przywołuje dowody podważające takie wnioski.
Kolejną dziwną modą był jakiś śmieszny freudyzm (autorka tego tak nie nazywa). Przez wiele lat środowiska archeologiczne ignorowały znajdowane w jaskiniach elementy abstrakcyjne, skupiając się na figuratywnych dziełach sztuki, to znaczy takich gdzie najczęściej występowały zwięrzęta. Natomiast jakieś archeologiczne guru w latach 60. wrzuciło znaki geometryczne pozostawiane przez naszych dawnych przodków do worka "waginalno-fallicznego" i wygląda na to, że do dziś trudno to odkręcić. Autorka pisze: "Kiedy zaczęłam tworzyć dokładne stanowiska każdego stnowiska sztuki prehistorcyznej (...) nieustannie natykałam się na opisy typu: trzy żubry, jeden koń (prawdopodobnie), dwa jelenie i sześć sromów."
Oczywiście kształty te nieraz okazywały się jakimiś trójkątami lub mogły być tak samo sromami jak czymkolwiek innym.
Jeszcze jeden przykład właśnie takiego "intencjonalnego" myślenia współczesnych to figurki grubych wenus. Genevieve pisze, że w paleolicie, kiedy już zaczęto tworzyć takie figurki, to były to równie często przedstawienia kobiet, mężczyzn, nieraz zwierząt. Przedstawień grubych postaci nie znaleziono więcej niż przedstawień postaci szczupłych. No ale współcześni skupili się na grubszych, nadali im nazwę "wenus" nadpisując tym samym mnóstwo znaczeń (wzorzec piękna, kult płodności) - do podręczników szkolnych trafia już tylko bardziej popularna gruba wenuska (po co młodym mieszać w głowie dodając jakieś inne przykłady figurek) i tak się tworzy nauka, proszę państwa 😉
Tak więc oprócz dociekań, o co chodziło tym naszym dawny przodkom gdy rysowali dwie kreski i kółko, "Pierwsze znaki" są świetną opowieścią o historii dość nowej nauki, jaką jest archeologia. Jak dla mnie -informacyjna bomba.

[Grace Tant · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this one. Really interesting discussion of possible origins and meanings of some of our simplest symbols, field research on this topic, and a little about Ice Age and other ancient civilizations. One of the few nonfiction books I'm inclined to reread.

Go for the audiobook if you can, because it's read by the incomparable Robin Miles. My library sadly didn't have it, but any interested friends are welcome to borrow my audiobook copy.

[Drew Reilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a surprising good read. Petzinger is knowledgeable and a good enough writer to keep you entertained enough to be interested I learning more. There was a very interesting chapter on shamans and the use of psychedelics, and whether there is evidence in cave drawing for that. Overall, if you are interesting in Pre-History, this is a good primer.

[Irfan Kaya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Much more enjoyable while googling the mentioned sites.

[Andrea McDowell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book. The explorations of the science and research uncovering the deep roots of creativity and communication in the human species (and related/prehistoric lines) was fascinating and deeply enjoyable.

[TN Pollio · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Gonzo Files: Reviews with an edge

What are the origins of the signs and symbols ubiquitous to humankind since the Stone Age? Patterns of cognitive, symbolic thought, frozen in time on cave walls but with no guide books explaining what it was all about. This surviving detritus of prehistoric humanity has been the focus of research ever since the first prehistoric art was discovered in the caves of Western Europe. Enigmas etched and painted onto stone, bone, and likely a bazillion other things that didn’t survive the trip from then until now – a time span of literally tens of thousands of years.

One intrepid explorer who is part Indiana Jones, part ferret and entirely fearless under the spectre of sudden subterranean demise is National Geographic Explorer Dr. Genevieve Von Petzinger, “Paleoanthropologist and cave art researcher, exploring the origins of symbols & graphic communication” extraordinaire. Her research from delving underground where no sane researcher has gone before contributes to a growing corpus of knowledge into the prehistoric mind; joining seminal literature from such notables as Dr. David Lewis-Williams (The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the origins of Art” & “The shamans of prehistory: Trance and magic in the Painted Caves”) What were these Paleolithic people doing and thinking in these eerie, godforsaken recesses of terra firma? In pitch blackness and stark, disorienting silence? So far underground, so many thousands of years past?

Significant but little understood is the fact these profuse, non-figurative symbols far outnumber the flashy zoomorphic cave art at places like Chavet and Lascaux – the places that get all the attention because they attract tourists and coin from curiosity seekers endeavoring to wonder at the Sistine Chapels of Fred and Wilma Flintstone. The aforementioned crazy lady with little to no endoskeletal hindrances somehow squeezes with ease through pinhole openings that even seasoned cave rats shake their heads at going “WTF, you can’t be serious!” Yet time and again, on the other side of that impassable interstice, is our intrepid researcher. No Houdini trick here. Nor magical compression through a sausage stuffer followed by reconstitution like Odo the shapeshifter on Deep Space Nine. But fully intact, standing tall, and furiously scribbling notes and snapping pictures of mysteries unseen by people’s peepers since time immemorial.

Doing the archaeological bump and grind through forbidden subterranean spaces is somehow in this paleoanthropologist’s DNA. Bet the keys to my new Lamborghini her infatuation started early in life, like Jodi Foster���s youthful interstellar exuberance in the movie “Contact”. Laugh and giggle if you must, lads, but perfectly OK for inquiring girls (not boys) to throw playthings aside, strap tiny flashlights onto their bicycle helmets, and go crawling through ancient sub-basements under a full moon at midnight, looking for ancient mysteries. And having a ball before realizing the Triple AAA batteries in her toy flashlight ran out of gas, its pitch black down there, and unseen horrors begin creeping about, going bump in the night. Adding insult to injury is the fact her asthma inhaler is back upstairs in the dresser drawer.

What she’s found in these inaccessible recesses are solidified human thoughts; remarkable for the consistently with which they reappear over the course of eons. In these liminal spaces, hitherto the domain of ferrets, rats and other critters unencumbered by things like endoskeletons. These symbols and mind blowing artwork begin appearing in Europe at the latest during the Aurignacian Period. But as Von Petzinger points out, although the European stuff gets all the attention, there are likely sites galore awaiting discovery in Asia and especially Africa, conceivably home to the oldest extant examples on Earth.

Although the meaning of symbols and abstraction varies greatly over time, their continual recurrence identifies them as archetypal, meaning universal rather than specific to place, time or belief system. The natural inclination upon viewing is to assume they represent the doodling and graffiti of ancient people, etched with neither clear meaning nor intention. But their universality, interconnectedness and enduring nature obviates more than idle scribbling: a (now lost) spiritual component that has sadly evanesced, along with these ancient artists.

In the Paleolithic and Mesolithic Periods cave art and associated behaviors began appearing in both domestic environments and external petroglyphs (rock carvings), and undoubtedly also organic and more perishable objects that have not survived. In the Neolithic Period, they’re found not only on megaliths, but also portable objects such as stone and terracotta figurines, tools, weapons and primitive musical instruments. By the Bronze and Iron Ages, a number were incorporated into decorative schemes, belief systems, writing systems, jewelry, tattoos and other articles of personal adornment. Many are still seen today in a myriad of sacred and secular contexts – testament to their mysterious, archetypal nature.

They encompass a number of cryptic, hocus pocus symbols, like circles, squares, triangles, dots, zigzags, spirals, chevrons, cruciforms, etc. Von Petzinger lists 32 frequently encountered “cave signs” (see accompanying illustration), as per the printing of The First Signs. A remarkable compendium of exploration in hundreds of caves that makes plain this is not idle doodling by kiddies and bored cavemen. Obviously no linear continuity of meaning nor intent over so vast a stretch of time. But based upon neurological research, these primordial signs likely originated in the human subconscious. Which explains their continuous reoccurrence over the course of – at a minimum – the last 50,000 years of hominin history.

Of course, original meaning and purpose behind Paleolithic symbology is now beyond our comprehension. But their value is preservation of prescient steps taken towards the proto-writing from later sites such as Jiahu in Henan Province, Tas Tepeler in Anatolia, and the Vinca (Old Danube) scripts of Neolithic Europe. Enter Chalcolithic and early Bronze Age systems for calculating inventory and eventually true writing systems, in Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley. No liner progression from Fred Flintstone to Hammurabi, to be sure. But visible, palpable steps nonetheless, preserved for posterity.

The spiritual aspects of these primeval, archetypal symbols was examined earlier in the 20th century by pioneering psychologist and accidental mystic C.G. Jung. He believed there resides within the human psyche a genuine religious function, compelling each individual to seek meaning, validation and redemption in their life. And placate forces greater than oneself to ensure survival in these unforgiving primordial environments. Obviously, expressions of something much deeper than the need to kill a little time by hiking a mile underground in the dark to splay charcoal and ochre over these forbidding and nearly inaccessible spaces.

Researcher David Lewis-Williams cites neurological studies suggesting Jung’s religious locus is somehow centered in “the anterior convexity of the frontal lobe, the inferior parietal lobe, and their reciprocal interconnections ….. (interconnections that) automatically generate concepts of gods, powers and spirits” – referring to whatever supernatural entities these prehistoric people bowed down to and supplicated in their efforts to survive another day. Nuanced philosophical expression was probably beyond the purview of these ancient people.

In addition to majestic creatures of the hunt and enigmatic symbols, are positive and negative handprints of both adults and children from so many caves. Speculation includes evidence of shamanistic practices and arcane rituals for reaching through to the “other side”. Pressing one’s hand thereupon permeated a barrier or membrane separating the living from the spirit world of ancestors and sundry primordial forces in control of human destiny.

Much remains to be discovered and correlated with existing research from other sites and disciplines. But as Dr. Von Petzinger points out, when all’s said and done, it’s likely impossible to say with certainty what was going through these people’s minds during the commission of these curious symbols, curvilinear doodling and masterful portrayals of extinct megafauna. Yet many of these same motifs remain common in modern faiths, philosophical practices and decorative schemes. And through sensory deprivation, hallucinations (and hallucinogens), chanting, music, meditation, prayer and rhythmic movement, transcendentalists still endeavor to cross the threshold betwixt the physical and metaphysical realms – the sine qua non of any mystical experience.

Editor’s Note: Dr. Von Petzinger’s original claim of having being chased out of a Sicilian cave by a Cretaceous velociraptor has been clarified as follows: “Outside Palermo, I was chased out of a cave by a hideous hairy Sicilian named Ignazio. It’s surprisingly easy to confuse the two.”

[David Koerner · Rating 5 out of 5]

In “The First Signs,” Genevieve von Petzinger recounts her survey of symbols in European Pleistocene cave painting. She delivers much more, however. I first became aware of her work through her popular Ted talk (
https://www.ted.com/speakers/geneviev...). In the book, she explains her research tallying and classifying “non-figurative” symbols in more detail. While these symbols are not thought to constitute “writing,” per se, they may presage its origins by tens of thousands of years. To set the stage, von Petzinger spends worthwhile time recounting what is known about the evolution of culture in Pleistocene man going back a few hundred thousand years. This review alone is worth the price of the book!!

The discovery of cave art and music artifacts in Europe dates from about 50,000 years ago, well after the first appearance of anatomically modern humans (~300,000 years ago). This has led to the notion of a cultural explosion at the later time, wherein modern bodies belatedly acquired modern minds. Von Petzinger points out, however, that this “explosion” may be the result of migration to Europe and to a Euro-centered set of observations. The discovery of ochre pigments and bead jewelry in Africa dates back much earlier and suggests that the “modern” human mind may have co-existed with modern human bodies well in advance of the putative “explosion.”

Von Petzinger deliciously recounts her cave explorations, and one gets a feel for just how much evidence of Pleistocene culture is out there: over 300 painted caves in Europe alone. A vivid picture emerges in which Ice Age hunter-gatherer humans are wandering about Europe from 60,000 years ago. The narrative provides welcome relief from the popular notion that human culture appears in the Middle East out of nowhere about 5-6,000 years ago, a view supported by religious fundamentalists believing in a biblically literal Adam and Eve. In light of Pleistocene archeological evidence, there’s just no excuse for such a view!

“The First Signs” is meticulously notated with end-notes and provides a good foundation for further study. I look forward to future work that documents Pleistocene graphical representations in other parts of the world, especially in the western hemisphere to which humans may have migrated as early as 20,000 years ago. Pleistocene culture comprises a fascinating story that is just beginning to unfold!

[Robyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

FULL REVIEW WITH AMAZING, JAW-DROPPING, HEART-STOPPING GIFS HERE AT THE OLD BLOGGO

Hey hey, cupcakes. It’s been a minute. Blame that chubby little muthafucka Cupid, whose golden arrow hath pierced my once-frigid heart and set it ablaze with Love’s undying flames. Or whatever.

Ahem. MOVING ON.

So as I’ve mentioned (*cough* whined about) before, my brain has got a severe case of the Love-Struck Stupids (band name, write that down) and my Goodreads challenge is taking a hit. And, you know, my intellectual fortitude and general mental well-being.

But fear not, good comrades, for I have stumbled upon a solution – the good old NONFICTION BENEDICTION. That’s right, it’s back, babies.

To the review mobile! This week, it’s The First Signs: Unlocking the Mysteries of the World’s Oldest Symbols by Genevieve von Petzinger.

Cover Talk:

Okay, okay. Come through, nonfiction. I see you. Well done, son.

The Summary Heist:

Read the damn blurb, it's at the top of the page innit.

Robyn Says:

So I’ve been making a conscious effort to begin cultivating a meaningful, well-rounded, spiritually healthy life I can be proud of –

Fuck me that sounds like pretentious new-age hipster bull-shit doesn’t it?

Ok so I been tryna cross off the third item on Shaun’s classic to do list. I mean, I’m a grown-up now innit? Bout time. So the room’s been cleaned out of its adolescent fuckery, the books have been (somewhat) weeded, I got rid of most of my band t-shirts, Twitter and Tumblr, the two greatest time-suckers ever known to man, have been banished from my phone… and I have embarked upon a nauseatingly clichéd course of self-improvement of my own design, cribbed heavily from those terrible, eye-roll-worthy lifestyle gurus you can’t avoid on instagram and youtube. I know, I’m pathetic.

So my new morning routine is about as gag-worthy as you’d imagine (“be still for 3 minutes, and embrace the quiet of your newly awakened mind” FUCK RIGHT OFF, ROBYN, YOU ABSOLUTE TURNIP) but one thing I am kinda proud of is my resolution to learn more – actively learn, I mean, rather than the passive sort of serendipitous knowledge thievery I’ve been doing since bolting out of Western with my MLIS and running hell for leather back to the 6ix, home of my people and more importantly, somewhere that is not London-asshole-of-the-world-Ontario.

To make a long story even fucking longer, I’ve been watching TED talks every morning while I scarf down breakfast. I know everyone’s gaga for the TED talks, but I’m finding that they’re definitely a mixed bag for me. I can’t stand the self-help ones. The ones I do like are, surprise surprise, the ones in which a nerd gets to nerd out for 12 epically nerdy minutes. Watch it yourself right here (see what kind of service you get on this blog? smh i’m amazing)

(IT'S AT THE BLOG WHY NOT GO TO THERE)

WHOA. WHOA. WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOA. Amiright? Just… whoa.

Mind understandably blown, I did what any sane person would do, and went to the library. Okay, it was 6:15 in the morning and I had to work, so I actually went to the library’s website – and here, my good people, we have an example of one of the classic arguments in favour of ebooks, because I was able, with only a few clicks of the mouse, to check out the digital edition of von Petzinger’s book and start reading it less than 3 minutes after watching her TED talk. Fucking amazing. Yeah technology. Yeah science. Yeah nerds. Yeah books. YEAH LIBRARIES BITCH!

Oh… you wanna know about the actual book? Ok, jesus, calm down, keener.

It was fucking awesome. It’s amazing to actually read about something that is probably a huge a discovery as it’s in the process of being discovered. Von Petzinger basically stumbled into her field of research thanks to a fateful mixture of serendipity and curiosity, and even though she’s still conducting her research and her conclusions are constantly evolving, it’s clear that she’s onto something big. The book basically discusses her attempt to catalogue the geometric signs of Ice Age Europe’s cave art, which have been pretty much uniformly ignored by previous scholars who preferred to focus their attention on the depictions of animals that dominate most sites.

(And sidenote, if you wanna live your best life you should IMMEDIATELY watch the documentary by the one and only, the king of glorious weirdness, the great Werner Herzog himself, Cave of Forgotten Dreams… oh look I found it for you YOU’RE WELCOME)

(GO TO THE BLOG GO TO THE BLOG GO TO THE BLOG)

Back to the squiggles. Some reviewers seemed to be dissatisfied with the book because von Petzinger doesn’t actually draw many conclusions from the data she’s collected. For me, that wasn’t a problem – if anything, I was relieved. She’s still deep in the process of collecting information. Anything beyond very general hypotheses would be far too hasty. Good science is slow science. While von Petzinger does theorize that it seems likely the geometric signs found all across Ice Age Europe and Asia have a common origin and perhaps even common meanings, she doesn’t touch on what those meanings might be – because it’s impossible to even guess at this early stage.

I really enjoyed the exploration of early humans and language, both verbal and nonverbal. It made me want to dig out my old linguistics textbooks from undergrad. Actually, this whole book made me curious. I want to keep learning – not just about Ice Age cave art, but about early humans in general, language development theories, the first written languages, the development of alphabetical writing systems… and so much more. And isn’t that the mark of not just a good nonfiction book, but a great one?

Dude. I love nerds.

Verdict:

Read it. Amazing. Mind-blowing. Will cure you of the worst case of the Love-Struck Stupids since the Trojan War, when basically everyone was Love-Struck and Stupid.

Best lines:

God, screw y’all, what I am, your mama? Go read the damn book for yourself.

Fancasting couch:

Behold, your theoretical Ice Age cave artist.

(AGAIN, PLEASE VISIT THE BLOG TO VIEW THIS XXX-RATED, A1 QUALITY CONTENT)

Listen I googled “sexy caveman” and this was the first result? Who am I, a mere mortal, to question the awesome and all-knowing Google?

Book Boyfriend material:

Leather speedo up there. He’s no broad-shouldered, ill-tempered, dragon-slayer, but he’s really rocking that fur stole.

Rating:

9 out of 10 mysterious Ice Age squiggles that probably mean “the aliens put us here you twenty-first century knobs” or maybe “boobs,” we’ll never know.

ROBYN’S FINAL THOUGHT:

*Werner Herzog voice* Those abstract and chaotic signs inscribed on the walls of a man���s heart are unknowable, for in the cavernous darkness of the soul, no light ever shines upon them.

Srsly tho it’s writing, right? The most basic kind of pictographic communication, yeah, but still… it’s writing. Awesome-sauce.

*

Oh, heyyyyy Titus. What’s new, furry baby?

I, too, find myself facing literary stagnation. Get away from me, Librarian, and let me wallow in peace.

Ah, Classic T.

Until next time, pop-tarts and -tarlets!

-xo, R

[Kim Miller-Davis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an absolutely fascinating read about our ancient human ancestors and the mysteries they left behind on the walls of caves. After showing Petzinger's Ted Talk to my Humanities students last fall, I ordered this from Amazon, but somehow never got around to reading it until now. Yesterday, after showing the Ted Talk to my Summer students, I walked straight to my bookcase, picked it up, and became completely immersed.

Petzinger's book chronicles her trek to Paleolithic cave art sites throughout Europe. Although her quest is dedicated to examining and cataloging 32 recurring symbols that remain undeciphered and enigmatic, Petzinger does not bore us with dry, academic language. Instead, her narrative reads as if she is taking her readers on a Sherlock Holmes-style mission. When she defines terms or explains processes, she does so in such a way that it seems as if she is unwrapping a clue rather than delivering a professorial lecture--a perfect approach for the anthropological laypeople in her audience.

Interestingly, the narrative unfolds in such a way that as the suspense behind the symbols builds, the audience knowledge base deepens. This is entirely due to Petzinger's casual yet professional style. As she approaches each site, she provides a personal anecdote about the trip itself before launching into a vivid description of the surrounding environment (which always includes some type of sensory details like the feel of the air or the colors of the landscape). By interspersing the didactic with the visceral and the personal, Petzinger keeps her readers riveted.

Ultimately, Petzinger's passion is not only transmitted, it is transferred. The inexplicable existence of these symbols across Europe pervades the narrative with such an intensity that deciphering their meaning will become an immediate, unrelenting priority for anyone who opens the book and joins Petzinger on her journey.

[Angeliki · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't think I will ever complete it. I don't love the descriptions of climbing on the rocks or how she felt in that or the other moment - I got a non-fiction book because I wanted to read about ancient graphic design history, not about the author's experience. Also, I didn't particularly appreciate the mention in the beginning of the book to "having pattern recognition in her blood" because her grandmother was working in the Enigma project. Well, I think that's the whole point of the book - we all have pattern recognition in our blood otherwise reading signs, texts and images wouldn't work and we wouldn't have created them.
Also I am tired of having the author taking me back and forth in time in several places in the book. I would like instead of seeing "75.000 years ago" to see in on a figurative timeline.
To be fair, the book has merits - it is full of interesting facts about human history and the author seems a renowned, knowledgeable scientist. At points, it is also thrilling to try to think with the author what a figurine might mean. I also appreciate that the first page of the book gives us all the important signs she discovered. Probably it will be a great book for anthropologists. I think it would be a much more interesting read for me if it was illustrated (beautiful timelines, coloured images, pictures from museums) and less heavy with descriptions of her own experiences.

[Casey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Signs and symbols of our earliest ancestors, how cool is that? The whole book, very well written (grammar, word choice, sentence structure), explores the cognition of humans living 40,000 to 10,000 years ago, but provides no definitive answers---that would be unseemly in a scientist. However, Dr. von Petzinger is unafraid to share her beliefs, her enthusiasm for more research, and the very new method by which she attacked the question of symbolic cognition in ancient humans. She breaks new ground, and takes the reader on an exciting quest through the caves of Africa and Europe, looking for marks that previous researchers discarded as uninteresting (because they did not depict bison, etc.).

Then, beginning on page 245, it was almost an altered state of consciousness to read about the symbols that our eyes and brain produce on their own when deprived of all data (such as in the complete darkness of a cave), and how that may or may not relate to the symbols in the caves. Fascinating. And now I'm reading an account of the evolution of human consciousness, and my mind keeps going back to our distant ancestors and their signs. Was their consciousness like ours?

[Wiedźma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Von Petzinger podeszła do temat z pasją, dzięki czemu nawet dla laików staje się on niezwykle interesujący. Autorka przechodzi do kolejnych zagadnień w sposób logiczny, nie pomijając nawet najbardziej oczywistych kwestii, co pozwala czytelnikom dogłębnie zrozumieć ogólną problematykę pierwszych symboli pozostawionych przez naszych praprzodków.

Całość na: https://wiedzma-czyta.blogspot.com/20...

[Vicki M. Z. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was under the impression that this book had more linguistic aspects and explanations, instead of the mostly archaeological and anthropological explanations it contained. Even then, the author gave a great recounting of her adventures in European caves: descriptions of caves and the surroundings are complete, pictures and notes add to the narration and background information paint an in-depth history for those with close to little knowledge of rock art (aka me). Her brief flashes of humour are fresh. I was a little disappointed that there wasn't exactly an answer to what the first signs represented - I wanted more information on this historical pictographic language and what these signs might semantically mean/represent and the general linguistic aspects. Still, an educational read.

Also watched her TED talk, which was just a recap of her book (including repetition of several sentences from her book).

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author collected and examined cave art signs, both from existing explorations and newly conducted ones, from around Europe and South Africa. Her premise was that the geometric markings are at least partly symbolic, rather than figurative or random. She collected the markings into 32 specific types/styles, then attempted to understand why they were common in widely separated cave art sites and what they might mean. Most of the book rehashes early hominid archaeology and its relationship to cave art. Her addition of environmental conditions to the existing interpretations of cave art helped her propose improved interpretations, though her conclusions remain weak and highly speculative.

"The Oldest Enigma of Humanity" takes on some of the same interpretation challenges, but is at least as speculative as First Signs.

[Janta · Rating 3 out of 5]

An intriguing analysis of non-figurative symbols (i.e., the things that aren't drawings of animals or people) in the rock art of Ice Age Europe. Von Petzinger has some interesting theories, and I hope more research is done into this area. The author's style is mostly pretty readable; my only quibble is that in a few places in the text she switched into present tense. I suppose it was to give a sense of immediacy to the narrative (she used present tense when describing some of her visits to various caves and rock art sites), but I found it distracting & annoying, particularly when she switched tenses in the middle of a paragraph.

(I admit I may be a bit old-fashioned when it comes to this sort of thing.)

[Lacy Phillips · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently watched a BBC series called The Secret History of Writing and enjoyed it very much, so when I saw this book's subject matter, I was instantly fascinated. My first exposure to early writing was a few decades ago when the Ink and Blood museum exhibit of biblical artifacts was on tour in the US that covered the history of writing from cuneiform to the Guttenberg press, and ever since then I've been fascinated by the development of written language and symbology. This book covers the very early history of human art and communication and covers a wide range of theories. I like that it's like one part field journal or travelog and one part discussion of different theories. My attention did wander some which I think was symptomatic of the organization being a bit haphazard.

[Warren · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book more. Von Petzinger cataloged symbols found in European cave art before the neolithic revolution and found common symbols across the continent and tens of thousands of years. I thought she would have a part on each symbol, where it was all found and over what time frame. But that didn't happen, she mostly discussed history and other topics. Maybe I went into the book expecting something different than the author's intent, but I read the book with the hopes of learning more about the symbols, instead they were relegated to a page in the front and not discussed elsewhere as much as I wanted.

[Marcella · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this but I think it could've been half the length. I enjoyed the content, but towards the end I felt that I was re-reading information. It was a cool book, though! Maybe better as a TED talk :)

One thing I thought the author did remarkably well was to explain a vast field of research for general consumption. She covered many tricks of the trade but wove them into the narrative without overwhelming the untrained reader. The footnotes were also full of useful references.

Overall, this book was interesting and I'd say it's worth reading a couple chapters.

[Elisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

While there were many interesting tidbits of knowledge, I felt the book lacked an over-arching thesis. She kept introducing new hypotheses about meaning, only to prove them inadequate. In the end, the main through-line seemed to be the ever-increasing size of her data pool. It was particularly hard to listen to as I kept feeling the need for examples of the drawings she was discussing. The ending was particularly disappointing. I actually re-listened to the conclusion FOUR times, each time thinking I must have gotten distracted or fallen asleep, but it just petered out.

[Fred Rose · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sort of a written version of a TED talk. Solid science but not written like a typical science book ("the hair on the back of my neck stood up") which is ok for the most part. I'm supportive of scientists taking a risk and speculating on what something means and how they feel about it. Would like to have seen more about the actual signs and what they could mean. It was covered at the end of the book but could have been more. I guess this indicates how early in the process this work is.

[Rob Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good general overview of cave art symbols and their development but as other reviewers have said, doesn't quite deliver on the promise of the subtitle.

Whilst the author's project of cataloguing signs and symbols is interesting and worthy, the book isn’t quite the radical rewriting of the history it claims to be.

The chapter on Entopic images hints at a Jungian collective consciousness without taking the final leap.

[Owlsinger · Rating 2 out of 5]

The subtitle should have been: "How We Are Attempting to Unlock...etc.". Disappointing in the respect that we still don't know what these symbols mean, but fascinating to learn of the techniques involved in dating them and relating one set, and one site, with all the others.