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The earliest undisputed evidence of prehistoric art dates to the Upper Paleolithic, some 50,000 to 40,000 years ago (see Upper Paleolithic art).〔According to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the earliest known art is dated to 40,000 B.C., at Ubirr in northern Australia. The New York metropolitan museum of art ( Heilbrunn Foundation ) Retrieved 2011-09-17〕 Visual art began with emergence of sculptures, beads and cave paintings of Europe, Africa, Americas and Australia in the cultures of ''Homo sapiens'' at around 40,000 years ago.〔edited by ( A. Toomela ) T. Ahmed & B.L. Miller - Cultural guidance in the development of the human mind - 245 pages ISBN 1-56750-573-2 → ( ABC-CLIO, 2003 ) → () Retrieved 2011-09-16〕 Together with religion and other cultural universals of contemporary human societies, the emergence of figurative art is a necessary attribute of full behavioral modernity. There is, however, evidence of an emerging "preference for the aesthetic" among the ''Homo Erectus'' of the Lower Paleolithic (Old Stone Age) and the ''Homo sapiens'' of the Middle Paleolithic (Middle Stone Age) in the period leading up to the beginning Upper Paleolithic, from 200,000 to 50,000 years ago, in particular in the high symmetry exhibited by stone tools, often manufactured with much greater care than would strictly be needed to arrive at an operative hand-axe. ==Pre–''Homo sapiens''== The earliest evidence of artistic activity, in the form of diagonal etchings made with a sharks tooth, was found in 2014 on a 500,000-year-old fossil of a clam found in Java in the 1890s associated with Homo Erectus.〔http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22429983.200-shell-art-made-300000-years-before-humans-evolved.html#.VISuEibfWnM〕 ''Homo erectus'' had long before produced seemingly aimless patterns on artifacts such as is those found at Bilzingsleben in Thuringia, and these might be understood as a precursor to art, as well as to reveal some intent of the artificer to decorate and fashion beyond practical necessity. The symmetry and attention given to the shape of a tool has led authors to see Acheulean hand axes and especially laurel points as artistic expressions. The Mask of La Roche-Cotard has also been taken as evidence of Neanderthal figurative art, although in a period post-dating their contact with ''Homo sapiens''. Similarly, the "Divje Babe flute" has controversially been claimed as a Neanderthal musical instrument dating to about 43,000 years ago. There are other claims of Middle Paleolithic sculpture, dubbed the "Venus of Tan-Tan" (before 300 kya)〔, pp. 145-146〕 and the "Venus of Berekhat Ram" (250 kya). Both objects may be natural rock formations with an incidental likeness to the human form, but some scholars have suggested that they exhibit traces of pigments or carving intended to further accentuate the human-like form. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Art of the Middle Paleolithic」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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