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Prehistoric Art in Europe: A Deep-Time Social History

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

John Robb
John Robb*
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, Cambridge University, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3DZ , UK ([email protected])
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Abstract

Although many researchers have studied prehistoric European artthere has been virtually no attention paid to the broad prehistory of art as a specialized form of material culture: virtually all studies focus narrowly on single bodies of art. This paper presents a new approach to analyzing prehistoric art: quantitative deep time study. It analyzes a database of 211 art traditions from across Europe and from 40,000 B.C. to 0 AD.to identify changes in the amountnatureand use of prehistoric art. The results reveal clear long-term trends. The amount of art made increased sharply with the origins of sedentary farming and continued to rise throughout prehistory. New forms of art arise in conjunction with new ways of life: “period genres “ are closely tied into patterns of social change. There are also long-term shifts in aesthetics and the uses of art (such as a gradual shift from arts of ritual and concealment to arts of surface and display). These resultsthough preliminaryshow that a deep-time approach familiar from topics such as climate change is applicable to art; the resulting social history can illuminate both art and its social context.

Résumé

Résumé

Muchos investigadores han estudiado el arte europeo prehistóricosin embargo apenas se le ha prestado atencidn a la amplia prehistoria del arte como una manifestatión especializada de cultura material: casi todos los estudios que existen se centran estrictamente en un único tipo de arte. Este artículo presenta una nueva manera de analizar el arte prehistórico utilizando un estudio cuantitativo de tiempoprofunda. Analiza una base de datos de 211 tradiciones artísticas europeas desde el 40,000 a.C. hasta el 0 a.C. para identificar cambios en la cantidadnaturaleza y uso del arte prehistórico. Los resultados revelan claras tendencias a largo plazo.La cantidad de arte producido aumentó radicalmente con los orígenes de la agricultura sedimentariay siguió aumentando durante la prehistoria. Nuevos modules artísticos aparecen a la vez que emergen nuevos modos de vida ; “géneros de época “ están estrechamente vinculados a patrones de cambio social. También hay cambios a largo plazo en la estética ylos usos del arte (comoun cambio gradual de las artes del ritual y la ocultación alas artes de superficie y ostentación). Estos resultadosaunque preliminaresmuestran que un enfoque de tiempo profundo corriente en temas como el cambio climático es aplicable al arte; la historia social resultante puede iluminar tanto al arte como a su contexto social.

Type
Articles
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 80 , Issue 4 , July 2015 , pp. 635 - 654
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 2015

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