Archaeologists have discovered what are believed to be the world’s oldest known cave paintings on Muna Island in Indonesia, revealing new insights into the cultural and artistic abilities of early humans in Southeast Asia.
The discovery consists of tan-coloured hand stencils on limestone cave walls, dated to as old as 67,800 years. The handprints were created by blowing pigment over hands placed against the rock surface, a technique seen in prehistoric art across different regions of the world. Researchers from Indonesia and Australia made the finding while studying caves that have been used repeatedly for rock art over tens of thousands of years.
According to lead researcher Adhi, it was initially difficult to confirm that the markings were made by human hands. However, closer examination revealed clear fingertip shapes, some of which appear deliberately pointed or reshaped. These stencils were found beneath later paintings, including images of a person riding a horse and a chicken, showing that the cave walls were reused by different generations.
Maxime Aubert, an archaeological science specialist at Griffith University, said the oldest stencil is particularly important because it belongs to a style previously identified only in Sulawesi. This suggests a shared cultural tradition among early human communities in the region.
Co-author Adam Brumm noted that the modified fingertips may have carried symbolic meaning, possibly representing animal claws rather than human hands. He said this points to a complex symbolic relationship between early humans and the animal world, even though the exact meaning remains unknown.
To determine the age of the artwork, scientists used uranium-series dating by analysing tiny calcite deposits that had formed over the pigment. Using laser-based techniques, they measured uranium decay relative to stable thorium, allowing them to establish a minimum age for the paintings with high precision. Aubert said this method provided strong scientific confidence in the dating results.
The caves on Muna Island show evidence of artistic activity spanning thousands of years, with some images added as recently as 35,000 years after the earliest stencils. The newly identified art is more than 15,000 years older than cave paintings previously discovered in Sulawesi by the same research team in 2024.
Researchers say the findings support theories that early humans migrated through Sulawesi and surrounding islands, bringing with them not only advanced seafaring skills but also rich artistic traditions. The discovery strengthens evidence of long-standing cultural activity in Southeast Asia, alongside regions such as East Timor and Australia, where Aboriginal cultures are known to have existed for at least 60,000 years.
