A new study has revealed that mysterious signs carved onto Paleolithic artifacts up to 40,000 years ago match the information density of the world's earliest known writing system — pushing the deep ...

Statistical analysis reveals ancient bone carvings hold complex information rivaling early Mesopotamian scripts.

Discover the latest news, features and articles about ancient China's rulers, philosophy, and the Great Wall of China.

Researchers have uncovered compelling evidence that Stone Age humans were engraving complex, meaningful symbol systems onto ...

The birth of writing could be 40,000 years earlier than previously thought after scientists found etchings in a German cave.

More than 40,000 years ago, Ice Age humans were carving repeated patterns of dots, lines, and crosses into tools and small ivory figurines. A new computational study of more than 3,000 of these ...

The origins of writing aren’t set in stone. The ancient cave peoples weren’t as illiterate as portrayed in popular media.

Sculptures and tools from the Stone Age show markings that could be an early precursor to written language, according to a new analysis.

Mysterious signs engraved on objects reveal that a form of proto-writing may have been used in Europe 40,000 years ago, tens of thousands of years before the emergence of a full writing system ...

New research shows early humans created structured ancient symbol systems 40,000 years ago, long before formal writing appeared.

Over 40,000 years ago, our early ancestors were already carving signs into tools and sculptures. According to a new analysis ...

Ancient carvings once thought decorative may actually be early attempts to record information. Their statistical complexity matches that of proto-cuneiform, pushing the origins of writing-like systems ...