World's oldest fingerprint may be a clue that Neanderthals created art [View all]

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/may/26/like-a-face-discovery-reinforces-idea-neanderthals-created-art-say-experts

World’s oldest fingerprint may be a clue that Neanderthals created art

A man 43,000 years ago dipped a finger in red pigment and made a nose on a face-like pebble in Spain, scientists say

Sam Jones in Madrid
Mon 26 May 2025 12.45 EDT

One day around 43,000 years ago, a Neanderthal man in what is now central Spain came across a large granite pebble whose pleasing contours and indentations snagged his eye.

Something in the shape of that quartz-rich stone – perhaps its odd resemblance to an elongated face – may have compelled him to pick it up, study it and, eventually, to dip one of his fingers in red pigment and press it against the pebble’s edge, exactly where the nose on that face would have been.

In doing so, he left behind what is thought to be the world’s oldest complete human fingerprint, on what would appear to be the oldest piece of European portable art.

…

The dig team noticed there was something odd about the stone – which is just over 20cm in length – as soon as they found it while excavating the San Lázaro rock shelter on the outskirts of Segovia in July 2022. It did not look like something that had been used as a hammer or an anvil; it didn’t look like a tool at all.

“The stone was oddly shaped and had a red ochre dot, which really caught our eye,” said David Álvarez Alonso, an archaeologist at Complutense University in Madrid.

… more …

(How do they know it was a man?)