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| Reproduction of horse painting with hand stencils from Pech Merle Cave, France Source: Wikipedia |
I think that women always have had a special relationship with horses, which includes drawing and painting them. While researching the clip on animated paleolithic cave art, I came across the research of Dean Snow at Pennsylvania State University. He proposes that about 75% of the artists drawing animals in such caves as Altiamira Cave, Spain, and Lascaux Cave, France, circa 30,000 to 17,300 years ago, were women. Up to this time, most researchers and art historians assumed all cave artists were men-- probably involved in the creation of hunting magic.
Snow bases his proposal on the way men and women's hands differ. Usually the length of the index finger and the ring finger are roughly the same for women. The ring finger is longer than the index finger on most men. Hand stencils (pigment is flicked around the hand to create an outline) frequently occur as part of paleolithic cave art. Analysis of the outlines of these hands is how Snow determined that most of the artists were women, possibly female shaman involved in hunting magic.
Of course, there are alternative ways to analyze the same date. R. Dale Guthrie analyzed the measurements of palm widths and thumbs to conclude that the artists were adolescent boys interested in powerful animals and big busted fertility goddesses (think Venus of
Willendorf). Source:
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