News in Brief Archaeology

Cow carved in stone paints picture of Europe’s early human culture

Symbolic dots, style link 38,000-year-old engraving to other famous cave art finds

ancient wild cow stone engraving

CULTURED COW  A 38,000-year-old engraved stone (left), depicting an aurochs, or wild cow, covered with dots, was unearthed at a French rock-shelter. Symbolic elements of Europe’s earliest human culture appear in the engraving, its discoverers say. Drawings of the find (center) and of the aurochs separated from the dots show the scene more clearly.

P. Jugie/Musée National de Préhistoire (photo), R. Bourrillon et al/Quaternary International 2017

By Bruce Bower

- More than 2 years ago

This stone engraving of an aurochs, or wild cow, found in a French rock-shelter in 2012, provides glimpses of an ancient human culture’s spread across Central and Western Europe, researchers say.