Ancient Civilizations
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Why did humankind first create art? Cave painters used their mouths as brushes---20,000-30,000 years ago The ancient Sumerians were the first to divine astrology--- the zodiac---5,000 years ago What is the oldest known piece of art? Until 2 years ago, had been: • Venus of Willendorf • Austria, 22,000 BCE • Limestone, tinted with red ochre • Small, hand-held • Purpose--Fertility? Worship? The newest “oldest” is now: The Venus of Hohle Fels, Germany •35,000-40,000 years old •2-1/2” high •Made of wooly mammoth tusk •No head---could have been a pendant •Discovered in 9/2008 Cave Art --- Paleolithic Era “Old Stone” Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal, 40,000-10,000 BCE • First man--2 million years ago in Africa First Homo Sapiens--100,000 years ago in Altamira,• 15,000 Africa Lascaux, 17,000 • First art found made by Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal Man--Late Paleolithic (40,000- 10,000 BCE) Chauvet, 30,000 What might have been used to paint these figures? How does the rock influence the forms of these images? Is “spirit” reflected in these paintings? Cave Paintings—do you see stylistic differences? Chauvet (European, 30,000 BCE) vs Laas Geel (African, 8,000 BCE) Chauvet, France, discovered in 1994 Laas Geel Somaliland, discovered in 2002 Neolithic Era (8,000-2,000 BCE) how might art have changed when people settled in villages? • Ice Age ending • People begin to settle in permanent villages—CIVILIZATION • Begin farming and domesticating animals • First systems of writing developed • New arts emerge--pottery, weaving, architecture, megaliths, pictographs • Focus of art in Middle East—the Fertile Crescent Earliest Landscape, Catal Huyuk (Turkey), 6,150 BCE Civilizations arise around river valleys--- Egypt, India and The Fertile Crescent • The Fertile Crescent---Mesopotania (“land between two rivers”, Iraq) and Jericho (modern day Syria) • Settled in towns around 7,000 BCE • Arts and crafts become specialized Fertile Crescent Jericho Sumerian Culture—3,500 BCE • Mesopotamia, current-day Iraq • Invented first numerical system • Invented first known system of writing – cuneiform • Created first written music— hymn to Goddess Nikkal • Believed in a pantheon of gods • Wrote first epic--Gilgamesh • Wrote down laws—Hammurabi Code, 1790 BCE • Discovered how to mine metals— enter the Bronze Age What do you think was the purpose of these statues? Ziggurats---religious temples and dwelling place of gods Art serves religious and political purposes— can you name any other civilizations that have done the same? Ziggurat of Ur, 2200 BCE Ishtar Gate, Babylon, 600 BCE, glazed tile, 47 feet tall, now in Berlin animals of worship—mythical and real.