Climate Change Threatens the Existence of the Oldest Cave Painting in Sulawesi

KOMPAS.com – Climate change not only threatens the environment and living things. This condition also threatens a number of historical relics, one of them cave painting which is believed to be the oldest in the world, which is found in Sulawesi.

Cave painting the oldest in question is a painting depicting a pig, as well as a hand-printed image found in Sulawesi.

The handprints are estimated to be 35,000 years old.

The findings also succeeded in rewriting thoughts about when and where ancient people developed artistic abilities and what this meant for the development of human cognition. Meanwhile, pig paintings were made at least 45,500 years ago.

Until 2014, cave paintings are thought to have come from Ice Age caves in France and Spain.

However, the two findings of the oldest cave paintings show that humans in other parts of the world did it too, even earlier.

Also read: Climate Change Gives Birth to a New Bear Species Named Pizzly, Like What?

But now, the oldest cave paintings are according to a study published in Scientific Reports experiencing a deterioration in conditions at an alarming rate, this is presumably due to the impact of climate change.

Quoting IFL Science, Monday (17/5/2021), the rock art is threatened by aggressive weathering caused by climate crisis which makes the surface degradation of the limestone cave where the two paintings are located.

Indonesia after all it is in the tropics, one of the places with the most dynamic atmosphere in the world, where global warming can be up to three times higher than anywhere else.

The research team led by Dr Jillian Huntley, a rock art conservation expert from the Griffith Center for Social and Cultural Research in Australia then realized that climate change could impact the oldest cave paintings, such as the oldest rock paintings in the world in Sulawesi.

Also read: Climate Change Threatens More Damage to World Heritage Sites

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