Researchers say the Sulawesi cave art predates previous finds by 15,000 years and may link early Indonesians to the first Australians. Map showing the island of Muna, Sulawesi. Credit: Generated by M. Kottermair and A. Jalandoni using ArcGIS.
MANILA, Philippines โ A new study has considered the 67,800-year-old hand stencil discovered inside a limestone cave in Indonesia as the oldest known example of rock art in the world. The findings have pushed back the timeline of human artistic expression by at least 15,000 years.
An international research team co-led by scientists from Griffith University, Indonesiaโs Badan Riset dan Inovasi Nasional (BRIN), and Southern Cross University has dated the artwork using uranium-series analysis. The study, published in Nature, showed that modern humans were painting on the island of Sulawesi at least 67,800 years ago.
The discovery not only resets records for the worldโs oldest cave art. It also strengthens evidence that early populations moving through Southeast Asia were culturally sophisticated. And this population may have a direct connection to the ancestors of Indigenous Australians.
Dated through mineral โtime stampsโ
The hand stencil was found in Liang Metanduno cave in southeastern Sulawesi, on the satellite island of Muna. It appears alongside other painted figures created thousands of years later, suggesting the site was used repeatedly over a vast span of time.
To determine the age of the stencil, researchers examined microscopic mineral layers that had formed over โ and in some cases beneath โ the painting. These mineral deposits contain trace amounts of uranium that decay at a known rate, allowing scientists to calculate a minimum age for the artwork.
The results showed the hand stencil is at least 67,800 years old, making it the oldest reliably dated cave art known to date. It is significantly older than a Sulawesi rock painting reported by the same team in 2024.
The findings also suggest that people returned to the cave to create art for at least 35,000 years, with painting activity continuing until around 20,000 years ago.
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A mysterious claw-like design
Beyond its age, the stencil is remarkable for its unusual design.
After the original hand outline was sprayed onto the cave wall, the negative shapes of the fingers were intentionally narrowed. The modification gives the image a claw-like appearance โ a feature not previously documented in ancient rock art elsewhere.
Professor Maxime Aubert, an archaeologist and geochemist from Griffith University who co-led the study, said the new evidence confirms Sulawesi as one of the worldโs most important early artistic centers.
โIt is now evident that Sulawesi was home to one of the worldโs richest and most longstanding artistic cultures, with origins dating back at least 67,800 years,โ Aubert said.
Professor Adam Brumm of Griffith Universityโs Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution said the symbolic meaning of the narrowed fingers remains unclear.
The altered hand may reflect beliefs about close connections between humans and animals. Earlier Sulawesi cave paintings include scenes interpreted as part-human, part-animal figures โ suggesting that complex symbolic thought was already present among these early communities.
Implications for Australiaโs first peoples
Dr. Adhi Agus Oktaviana, a rock art specialist at BRIN and one of the study team leaders, said the discovery has important implications for understanding the deep-time roots of Aboriginal Australian culture.
โIt is very likely that the people who made these paintings in Sulawesi were part of the broader population that later spread through the region and ultimately reached Australia,โ Oktaviana said.
For decades, scholars have debated when and where the earliest forms of symbolic art emerged. The Sulawesi hand stencil adds to growing evidence that some of the worldโs oldest artistic traditions developed not in Europe โ long considered the cradle of cave art โ but in Southeast Asia.
As researchers continue to survey Indonesiaโs vast cave systems, more discoveries could further reshape the story of human creativity โ and the journeys of the first modern humans across the globe.
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