Return to Phi in the Acheulian. Return to The graphics of Bilzingsleben series, Part 1: Straight edge use by Homo erectus.
Go next to The graphics of Bilzingsleben series, Part 3: Base grids of a suppressed Homo erectus knowledge system.
“Mania & Mania have published...a series of marked bones from the German Acheulean site of Bilzingsleben, claiming that the markings were purposeful... [I] find no greater patterning in these marks than on the wooden cutting board in my kitchen.”
- Randall White, Anthropology, New York University, 1992: 545
SIDE COLUMN A: Because it challenges evolutionary thinking. “Certain bones from Bilzingsleben… have scratches in groups of parallel or radial lines. These could be due to butchery, especially as there are clear indications of knawing.” - William Noble & Ian Davidson Psychology and Anthropology, University of New England, 1991: 245-6 |
![]() The origins of language is a problem that has puzzled philosophers and now scientists for thousands of years because it has no known link to the natural world. Modern-day linguists (those who study language) and scientists who think only in evolutionary terms believe with little reserve that human language evolved gradually out of animal communication systems and that there were necessary stages of language development between ape cries or gestures and modern human words. Although evolutionary linguists seldom even mention who these middle language speakers might have been—writing primarily in abstract terms and without recourse to artifacts—they certainly mean them to be either early Homo sapiens (“less able” ancestors of our own species) or Homo erectus, formerly known as Pithecanthropus or the “ape-man.” However, famed linguist Noam Chomsky who revolutionized linguistics in the 1950s and 60s never believed that human language could have had any half-way-there stage but that it appeared as a fully-developed capacity. Even though evolutionary linguists believe that this is where Chomsky went |
“In my
opinion, the [Bilzingsleben] marks should not be thought of as anything
more than ‘self-sufficient,’ to use a term I once applied to some
chimpanzee scribbles.” - Whitney Davis Art History, Northwestern University, 1988: 103 “By suggesting that the deliberate marks indicate a faculty of abstract thought, the authors may in fact be trivializing their find. Its scientific significance is perhaps primarily that it does not indicate, but foreshadow such a faculty.” - Robert G. Bednarik Editor, RAR, IFRAO, 1988: 99 “There are a few objects that… bear markings that some have considered symbolic in nature, such as marked bone scraps from… Bilzingsleben… However, some of these may indeed have served practical functions such as ‘cutting boards’… Such ‘motifs’ are not repeated often enough to be recognized either as intentional or as a style.” - Philip G. Chase Anthropology, University of Pennsylvania, 1991: 210. “Over the course of hundreds of thousands of years there are no two [Acheulean or Mousterian] objects that are alike.” - Randall White Anthropology, New York University, 1992: 546 |
wrong, Chomsky’s
was, and still is, the most scientific position as there are no known
existing or historical ‘primitive’ languages. They are all
complex.
Ignoring evidence like this did not occur with the discovery of cuneiform or translation of hieroglyphs via the Rosetta Stone as neither of those discoveries challenged a religious dogma. However, in the biased modern science community, one must contend with the dogged belief that everything, including language, evolved from lower forms. Ironically,
despite many months of behind-the-scenes accolades from those present
at the program and others with copies of the Thumbnails handout—including linguists, psychologists, engineers, etc.—The Graphics of Bilzingsleben was immediately censored from the public record not only in the false |
“If the authors mean that the mark makers of Bilzingsleben exhibit preferences for orderly pattern... these kinds of preferences are well documented among the great apes.” “There is no need to invoke some ‘faculty for abstract thinking,’ like planning ahead, to account for these morphologies.” - Whitney Davis | report mentioned in Part 1, but in the
Fig. 9. Conference slide #24. Observation 6: The motifs are mirror images. Artifacts 1 & 3.
|
REFERENCES
Mania, D. and U. Mania. 1988. Deliberate engravings on bone artifacts of Homo erectus. Rock Art Research 5: 91-107.
John
Feliks is founder of the Pleistocene Coalition. He has specialized in
the study of early human cognition for nearly 20 years.