Ahoy-Hoy: Notes on the History of Human Communications

By David Blair

From prehistoric rock-art, the alphabet, strange military experiments, and the internet, this book tells some of the most interesting stories of how human communications have developed. Find out how communications tools have been used for nefarious means, and the future implications of using these tools.

• Language: English
• Publisher: David Blair
• Release date: Oct 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005594831

David Blair

Dave Blair is an mountain biker, outdoors enthusiast, and writer who lives in Edinburgh, Scotland. Constantly exploring his country on foot or on bike, he knows many of the best (and worst) places for mountain biking and for short mini-adventures.As someone who always loved reading cycling travelogues, it made sense for him to write about some of his own adventures in "Tyred Out".For more things Dave has done visit iworm.co.uk, or follow the author on Twitter @adam_blair.

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Copyrights and notes:

Published 2021

The images, text and other contents of this book are (unless otherwise identified):

© David Blair, 2021.

All Rights Reserved.

For more books visit:

http://www.iworm.co.uk

Ahoy-hoy - an old term used to greet a small sailing ship or a freight barge,

Ahoy - hello in Dutch. Hoy - barge.

Used by Alexander Graham Bell as the intended way to greet someone on a telephone. Later used in a similar manner by Monty Burns on The Simpsons.

1 - Rockart

Communications range from very subtle exchanges between two people, to writing, conversation, and then onwards to mass communication involving many people at once.

Initially communication was restricted in both distance and time. People could only communicate with those physically close to them and the ethereal nature of early communications, for example touch, sounds or motions, meant that the messages could not directly pass through time.  It's true that messages could be passed from person to person at distinct intervals, for example stories being passed through generations. But these particular communications are prone to changing, and the end result may bear little resemblance to the original message.

We can only really guess at the exact nature of these very early methods of communications which have been lost in time.

Later communication could be more permanently recorded by creating a physical representation of the message in the real world. While writings and drawings are the most obvious examples of these representations; counters, sculptures, bundles of sticks, and any other physical material organised in a pattern recognisable by consensus of the system users could be considered communications.

Some of these physical representations have survived. Written communications exist where we still have physical examples available to us. Some of the still existing first known specimens of such symbols used to communicate are known collectively as rock art.

Rock art is a term used for any human-made markings made on natural stone. These can be divided into; Petroglyphs, which are carvings into stone surfaces, and Pictographs which are rock and cave paintings.

The origins of rock art through the world are an enormous subject which fills many books. Here we will concentrate on the origins of rock art in Europe.

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Valcamonica, hunting scene (Dave Blair, 2000).

Until recently, it was thought that these expressions originated with homo-sapiens, the branch of the human tree from which we developed. But recent research seems to point to the other major branch, Neanderthals, having created some of the first examples of this art. If true, this would prove that Neanderthals, far from being the oafish characters depicted in modern culture were probably the cognitive equals of homo-sapiens.

The carbon dating of skulls and bones shows that it's likely that homo-sapiens arrived in Europe around 40-50,000 years ago. Therefore any rock art which exists and was created before this immigration must have been created by the already resident Neanderthals.

Interestingly, it's thought that homo-sapiens left Africa and headed towards south China much earlier, around 80,000 years ago. A find of 47 human teeth in a Chinese cave  were dated by a team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Usually this is difficult to do. However, in this case stalagmites which had grown over the teeth were shown to be at least 80,000 years old. Hence, anything found underneath these must be at least as old.

One theory is that at the same time as they headed for what is China today, homo-sapiens also tried to head north to Europe but came across the Neanderthals. The resulting conflict, probably not so much actual physical conflict, but more in who could exploit the local resources more efficiently, prevented homo-sapiens from gaining a foothold in the area. The Neanderthals appear to have been much better at hunting and foraging. They were also more able to deal with the cold and unwelcoming climate of Europe. It wasn't until much later, when the ice covered continent finally weakened the Neanderthals numbers to a point where they were no longer a barrier to the more numerous homo-sapiens, that they were able to populate the area.

Recent research may show that Neanderthal rock art exists. Indeed a new technique of dating may be proving that the Neaderthals were responsible for at least some of the art previously assumed to have been created by homo-sapiens.

A researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Dirk Hoffmann, has created a new method of measuring the age of minerals. It's known that radioactive uranium and thorium are present in small amounts in most minerals. On any rock wall, over thousands of years, a crust will form as these minerals are leached out of the rock. This crust will also form on top of any paintings made on the walls. While any uranium present will be slowly dissolved over time by any water present, making it's way into the crust being formed,  the thorium stays locked in the wall. By comparing the relative amounts of these radioactive substances in the wall and the crust, the age of the crust can be found. Thus any paintings found with this crust forming on top, must be at least the same age.

This test has recently shown that in three of the European caves tested, the crusts on top of paintings are around 65,000 years old, and therefore points towards Neanderthals as being the creators of the art.

Whoever created the first symbols painted on walls, there is no doubt that later examples were copied and ideas shared between branches of the human evolutionary tree.

These communicative art expressions include cave paintings such as the famous ones at the Lascaux Caves in the south west of France in which, about 17,000 years ago, some of the most impressive cave paintings in the world were created. In fact it has been called the 'Sistine Chapel' of cave art.

In 1940, in the town of Montignac in South-West France, lived an eighteen year old apprentice mechanic. His name was Marcel Ravidat. In his spare time, like most other teenagers, he'd often head out into the countryside around his home to explore. He'd spend hours with his friends and his dog, 'Robot', exploring the vast woodlands nearby.

Marcel and his friends; Georges, Simon and Jacques, were apparently trying to find a rumoured tunnel leading to a nearby mansion, when they came across a newly uncovered hole in the undergrowth which had been created when a tree, felled by the wind in a recent storm, had ripped up a large section of the ground along with its roots.

Carefully exploring the sizeable hole in the ground, Marcel climbed carefully down into the dark where he discovered the hole continued into a large cave. Unable to see clearly, he looked around as much as he safely could, before climbing back out into the fresh air, resolving to return with a source of light.

Some days later, Marcel and his friends made the return journey to the uprooted tree, this time with a torch. They climbed back into the hole, worked their way down to the tunnels beneath and for the first time in thousands of years, lit up the ancient paintings on the cave walls.

Sealed and protected perfectly by the surrounding chalky geology, the dry air in the cave had protected the paintings from degrading over the thousands of years since they had been painted. The paintings were so astonishing that even the group of eighteen year old friends realised their importance. For a week they kept vigil at the cave entrance, exploring further while ensuring that no-one else discovered the hole. Eventually, they decided to tell a teacher who they knew had an interest in prehistoric art.

The inside of the caves were absolutely covered in pictures of bulls, horses, deer and a single solitary image of a human, albeit with a birds head.

Unfortunately, just days after the discovery there was quite the unwanted intrusion into the lives of the friends; the Nazis invaded France.

Georges and Simon were forced to leave the area with their families, while Marcel and Jacques stayed, eventually becoming the first tour guides when the caves later opened to the public in 1948.

Some of the most well known images are of large animals which would have been around at the time of painting. Some 2000 individual images have since been cataloged, 900 of these are animals, the rest are mostly geometric symbols.

It's thought that the paintings were mainly created by spraying pulverised colour pigments down tubes made of wood or bone. There are various theories as to the meaning behind the drawings. It's agreed that it's unlikely the images are just art for arts sake. The subject matter of just symbols and animals seem to have been used to convey a message rather than just look beautiful. There are no trees, mountains, or other landscape features. Reindeer are almost completely absent, even though they were thought to have been in abundance at the time of the paintings. Indeed many reindeer bones have been found on the cave floor. The pictures are often layered on top of each other, despite there being free space on the walls. This indicates that it may be the process of making the image that is important rather than the final artistic effect.

The cave was used for a long period of time. Some of the earliest paintings are thought to be about 18,000 years old, while newer ones could be as young as 11,000 years old.

The site at Lascaux is not unique. There are many sites throughout the world where rock-art can still be found. Some in caves, some on rocks out on the open hillsides, some on individual boulders in the middle of sandy desert.

The positions of the painting in the caves are also interesting. They are generally deep down in the caves. Sometimes in difficult to reach areas. The darkness would have meant that flame torches would have been necessary to light the areas, creating unpleasant amounts of smoke in the unmoving air this deep into the caves. The paintings often incorporated the physical features of the wall into the creatures being represented. For example a sticking out bump in a wall may have become the torso of an animal. Moving the flame torches around would have created a sort of animation effect.

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Valcamonica, prehistoric buildings (Dave Blair, 2000)

There are various possible explanations for the abundance of these paintings and rock art throughout Europe. Some think that it was produced as boundary markers as the territories of different communities changed in tune with competition from other communities and the prevailing environmental conditions. The art used to indicate a communities right to exploit specific areas, thus minimizing conflict with neighbours.

Then there is the structural hypothesis. This was put forward by the French archaeologist, anthropologist and philosopher, Andre Leroi-Gourhan. He's famous for his explanation of human evolution. He pushed the idea that it was our transition to walking on two legs rather than four, which allowed us to use our hands for picking things up and manipulating tools, and in turn made our faces more easily used for gesturing and talking. This lead to the development of the cortex which came from our need to use technology and develop language.

Anyway, he claimed that the layout of the paintings in various cave systems wasn't just random. They followed a distinct pattern of distribution within each cave. As an example, he pointed out that in many sites, horses were located only in a central area. Structural layouts of the paintings would have indicated that diverse human cultures could create in ways governed by the structure of the human mind. And that rather than just being stupid cavemen, they were really smart.

To cut a long story short, and to give Andre credit, he tried to prove in a scientific way that there was a pattern to all the sites. But, instead his work showed that the evidence just wasn't there and he readily admitted that his idea was wrong.

Evidence from still existing ancient cultures such as the Australian Aboriginals and peoples of Papua New Guinea point to magical rituals being in wide use, mostly as a psychological booster for when scary and dangerous activities need to be carried out. Much like people, even nowadays, often stick to superstitions which help them to feel more confident, tribes of people in the past possibly created art to encourage the success of their hunters. The subject matter of much of the art doesn’t disprove this as much of it consists of animals being killed, or men with weapons.

Another likely theory for the paintings is that they were created to communicate with the spirits. Painting images on the walls may have been for giving thanks for kills made, worshiping the more interesting and stronger animals, or asking for the fulfilment of hopes. Most likely of all though, the art was created as a mixture of the above reasons.

Rock art also includes patterns physically made in rock by carving or chipping (petroglyphs). I worked for a time at one of the largest sites for these in Europe. I always found it strange that they weren't better known. Not many tourists ventured to see them (maybe this has since changed). It was an incredible place to visit.

The valley I lived and worked in, Val Camonica, is situated in the Alps, north of Milan and Brescia in Italy. It's covered in thousands of figures and symbols. I'd go for walks in the mountains and find forgotten examples of carvings on remote rocks.

These particular symbols are actually relatively young. The valley was thought to have only become habitable around 15,000 years ago as the ice of a huge glacier receded at the end of the last ice age. This left fertile and empty land for people to move onto. These people were known as the Camunni. They were still present when the Romans, after a brief fight, expanded north under the command of Augustus and took control of the valley in about 50AD.

The carvings were being recorded, photographed, and entered into a huge database by the centre I worked at.  It's thought that there are some 200-300,000 petroglyphs in total spread throughout the valley, although there are a few especially concentrated clusters.

Others working on cataloging and researching these images had various widely ranging opinions on their meaning.  Some were of the opinion that it's just ancient graffiti, albeit still of value to us as it depicts scenes from the time. For example it tells us what animals were being hunted. At the other end of the scale were those who consider at least a portion of the images to be some ancient language with higher meaning. Although it's arguable whether one of the most well know images of a man with a large penis having sex with a donkey has any higher meaning.

These opinions are reflected at other sites, the amazing images were thought of as being mere decoration, then people began to take notice of the accompanying geometric shapes.

In other sites throughout Europe most of these later images were thought to have been predominantly created by the earliest Homo Sapiens, (previously these were called Cro-Magnons, but are now referred to as Early Modern Humans (EMH)) to arrive, around 40,000 years ago. These guys were pretty much the same as Europeans today, albeit they were physically stronger due to their more active lives. Interestingly, their brains were also larger.

Mostly we know this from a few examples, most notably a skeleton found in the Cro-Magnon cave (from which the type of human was originally named)  in Dordogne in France. A digital scan of the skull interior shows that the brain was about 15-20% larger than ours. A difference of about a single tennis ball.

One possibility is that although our brain has shrunk, there has not been a reduction in intelligence, memory or other important brain functions. The size difference is merely due to evolution 'compressing' certain brain areas, shrinking unused portions and generally making the inner workings of the brain more efficient in terms of size and energy usage.  What is odd is how this has happened so quickly. Thousands of years, but a mere blink in evolutionary time. Sheer numbers of people and hence small evolutionary mutations and adaptions quickly emerging may be the answer.

It's hard to prove for sure that our brains are not getting more stupid. And if they were, would we be clever enough to realise it? In fact, the idea that we are getting more stupid in certain ways, less able to adapt, is a definite possibility.

There seems to be a correlation between population density and cranial volume. As people acquired more tools and less connections to the real world, and worked in groups capable of supporting each other in lean times, less 'wits' were required in everyday life to survive. Owners of smaller, more energy efficient brains (using about 20% of an average humans total calorie expenditure) started to out-survive the big brained during harsh times and events.

Another, and compatible, possibility arises from an interesting experiment started in 1959 by Soviet scientist Dmitri Belyaev. The experiment hasn't stopped since. It's still running today. It involves the domestication of wolves.

Using a starter population of completely wild and aggressive wolves, Belyaev and his team started a process of non-natural 'evolutionary' selection, using only one trait as the deciding factor in whether to select certain wolves for future breeding. That trait was simply the tameness of the wolves. By selecting individuals based on this trait, the scientists believed they were mimicking the evolution of dogs and humans as we were forced to work together in larger groups for hunting and agriculture rather than fighting as individuals.

By interfering in the breeding process like this, evolution is effectively sped up to an experimentally observable pace.

In natural populations, capital punishment would probably have assisted this evolutionary path as 'Blorg' the violent man who fought and stole food and generally bullied his way around would have been 'dealt' with by the others as a group.

Anyway, back to the wolves. As the experiment progressed, it was found that they became much less aggressive towards each other. At the same time it was observed that the animals became happier to live in groups and work with humans.

Physical changes accompanied these developments. The later wolves had smaller skeletons, and smaller and differently shaped brains. The impulsive anger and aggression of their ancestors has mostly disappeared from the wolves daily lives.

Whereas the original wild wolves were prone to concentrate on an individual task for longer and have sudden flashes of insight which would allow them to solve tricky puzzles, the more domesticated ones would rely more on each other (and their human handlers) to solve problems and provide resources.

The humans of the past wouldn't have been our intellectual or creative equals due to their lack of cultural foundations, but they were certainly responsible for the massive, explosive steps  (just like the wild wolves) forwards in language, communication and tools. Not just small improvements, chipping away over time slowly progressing technology, but massive, apparently sudden leaps of insight.

Insights such as the realisation that communicating through symbols made things easier and more profitable for everyone.

Some of the earliest 'art' representations made were decorations and carvings on tools. This may have started out as people with downtime just making their tools more attractive and then, at a later date, moved onto giving the symbols magical or religious significance. Decoration was probably the intermediate step between nothing, and drawing meaningful symbols on walls. It may be that the earliest representations are of hunting or fertility magical activities.

There is also the fact that it was around this time when a sharp increase in people living into old age occurred, meaning people started living long enough to become grandparents.  In most cultures we know of, grandparents took the role of caring for children, allowing the fitter, faster parents to spend more time sourcing food. This meant that learnt skills could now be passed from grandparents to children by communicating them in stories rather than leaving them to relearn for themselves what their parents had already spent time learning. Thus accelerating the rate of knowledge growth overall.

Probably the origins of written communication and hence 'communication through time' were built not on one single change, but on parts of all of the above changes and ideas. Of course as you are reading this, I'm also communicating with you through time and space.

There is a commonality and consistency of subjects and figures exhibited in rock art throughout the world. This testifies to some common origin.

Paleo-anthropologist Genevive von Petzinger, studied the symbols found around the world. Wanting to study the patterns of reoccurring symbols found, she built a database of the rock art found throughout the world. Digging through existing inventories and adding more examples from her own expeditions she found that there were thirty two distinct types