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posted by janrinok on Thursday May 03 2018, @05:08PM   Printer-friendly
from the got-old-wood dept.

The Independent has an article about a wooden statue found in peat bog which is 'twice as old as Stonehenge'. Named the Shigir Idol, it was found preserved in a peat bog back in 1890. New dating techniques suggest that it is around 11,000 years old, which would make it the oldest extant wooden sculpture.

Depicting a man with mysterious symbols inscribed on him - which scientists believe could be an ancient encrypted code - the statue is 1,500 years older than previously thought.

Scientists in Mannheim, Germany, used the most up-to-date carbon dating technology, called Accelerated Mass Spectrometry, to determine the statue's age.

Thomas Terberger, a professor at the Department of Cultural Heritage of Lower Saxony, part of the team who dated the Idol, told the Siberian Times: "The results exceeded our expectations.

"This is an extremely important date for the international scientific community. It is important for understanding the development of civilisation and the art of Eurasia and humanity as a whole.

"We can say that in those times, 11,000 years ago, the hunters, fishermen and gatherers of the Urals were no less developed than the farmers of the Middle East."


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Immerman on Thursday May 03 2018, @05:46PM (9 children)

    by Immerman (3985) on Thursday May 03 2018, @05:46PM (#675175)

    "Mysterious symbols", "encrypted code", or evven... going out on a limb here... just some zig-zag and hatching decorations.

    It'd be nice if they gave some hint as to why they believe there's some greater significance to the lines than just (possibly symbolic) decoration. Assuming it's anything more than attention-seeking of course.

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  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 03 2018, @05:53PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 03 2018, @05:53PM (#675184)

    Haha yeah that part leaped out at me too. So at most it is like every other religious symbol out there? Who would have the faintest idea what a cross means if there was zero info left about christianity? If they found an ancient power pole they'd think we worshipped the power grid.

  • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday May 03 2018, @07:17PM (1 child)

    by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Thursday May 03 2018, @07:17PM (#675251) Homepage Journal

    An ancient, encrypted code.

    How can they possibly know it is encrypted, and not plaintext?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 03 2018, @08:39PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 03 2018, @08:39PM (#675295)

      What if they used a one time pad?

      Wait... what if it is a one time pad?!

  • (Score: 2) by arslan on Friday May 04 2018, @04:03AM (2 children)

    by arslan (3462) on Friday May 04 2018, @04:03AM (#675478)

    Why does it have to be always something sophisticated when we speculate on stuff like these? Can't it be something mundane and simple like a primitive dildo or some dung scoop and the patterns are just decorative?

    • (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday May 04 2018, @04:09AM

      by Phoenix666 (552) on Friday May 04 2018, @04:09AM (#675482) Journal

      If you've ever spent time examining petroglyphs in the Southwest or somewhere, eventually it becomes clear that the translation generally works out to something like, "Thak has bigger one than Thud."

      --
      Washington DC delenda est.
    • (Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Friday May 04 2018, @05:11AM

      by Fluffeh (954) Subscriber Badge on Friday May 04 2018, @05:11AM (#675504) Journal

      Well, the thing is 5.3 meters (that's over 17 feet) in size, so I'm going to go ahead and rule out primitive dildo. I don't care how brave you are and all on this one, it's just not going to work. In other related matters, I'm also going to put the pin back into "dung scoop" for now. I get that fibre filled diets and all with the berries and grass clippings available back in the heyday of Siberia, but I am feeling pretty safe on not getting called out on this one either.

      *sips coffee*

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 04 2018, @07:27AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 04 2018, @07:27AM (#675533)

    "Mysterious symbols", "encrypted code", or evven... going out on a limb here... just some zig-zag and hatching decorations.

    It's Academia, just think of the future papers and PhD thesis work they can milk out of 'interpreting' these decorations (I've just been browsing through a book where I've never seen so much BS extrapolated from so little archaeological evidence, and we're not even talking 'Ancient Astronut' stuff here, but proper 'I've a Doctorate and lots of published papers' stuff), bet there'll be mention of 'proto-runes', attempts at shoehorning a 'lunar calendar' into it, etc. etc. (of course, as I've already mentioned the 'Ancient Astronuts' mob, that lot'll be screaming 'It's a Grey' and doing their best to fit the carvings into a depiction of the constellation of Orion..)

    Before I posted the above, I thought I'd just do a search, came across this [siberiantimes.com] and this [dailymail.co.uk] [both from 2014]
    Oh, and this [rense.com] as well from 2014..

    Oh bollocks...