Lesson · at least 67,800 years ago

The first hands

Long before writing, people left the outline of their own hands on cave walls. Some are the oldest pictures anyone has found.

Drawn in code for this page. Each dot is one drop of pigment; the bare shape is the hand.

How a stencil is made

Paint around the hand, not on it

A stencil is a negative. Someone pressed a hand flat against the rock and sprayed pigment around it, probably by blowing it from the mouth or through a hollow bone or reed. Lift the hand and its outline stays behind, bare rock framed in colour.

The red is ochre: earth coloured by iron oxide, ground to a powder and mixed with a liquid. It is the same red on this site’s mark.

The method is so simple that people seem to have found it again and again, in places as far apart as Indonesia, Spain and Patagonia. That is part of why a hand is the oldest kind of picture we can still read at a glance.

How do you date a painting?

Not directly. Red ochre has no carbon in it to measure. But water seeping down a cave wall leaves a thin film of calcite, the same mineral as limescale in a kettle, and over thousands of years the films build up into a crust on top of the paint.

Sample the layer nearest the paintits age is the youngest the paint can bepaintlimestone wallcalcite crust, newest layer on top
Simplified cross-section, not to scale. The crust can only start growing once the paint is there, so its oldest layer gives a minimum age.

Calcite takes in a little uranium from the water as it forms, and almost no thorium. Uranium decays into thorium at a known, steady rate, so measuring the two shows how long ago a layer formed.4 Scientists scrape a tiny sample from the layer closest to the paint.

That is why every date on this page says at least. The paint was there before the crust began. It could be older, but not younger.

The oldest dated, so far

Minimum ages, from the papers that report them.

Liang MetandunoMaltraviesoLeang KarampuangLubang Jeriji SaléhEl CastilloCueva de las Manos
Solid dots are dated sites. The dashed dot is a date other researchers dispute. Map: Natural Earth, Equal Earth projection.8
  • Liang Metanduno1Muna, Indonesia. Hand stencil, fingers narrowed to look like claws.At least 67,800 years ago
  • Maltravieso5Cáceres, Spain. Hand stencils. If the date is right, made by Neanderthals.At least 64,000 years ago, disputed
  • Leang Karampuang2Sulawesi, Indonesia. A painted scene: three human-like figures and a pig.At least 51,200 years ago
  • El Castillo4Cantabria, Spain. Hand stencil, near a red disc at least 40,800 years old.At least 37,300 years ago
  • Lubang Jeriji Saléh3East Kalimantan, Borneo. Hand stencils, near an animal painted at least 40,000 years ago.At least 37,200 years ago
  • Cueva de las Manos7Santa Cruz, Argentina. Hundreds of stencilled hands at one rock shelter.13,000 to 9,500 years ago
Each bar runs from now back to the minimum age. The open end points further back: the true age could be greater. Cueva de las Manos is shown as UNESCO’s range of 13,000 to 9,500 years ago.7

Where experts disagree: did Neanderthals stencil hands?

Yes, say the 2018 team.Crusts over paintings in three Spanish caves, including hand stencils at Maltravieso, gave ages older than 64,000 years. That predates modern humans in Europe by at least 20,000 years.5

Not proven, say their critics.Water running over a cave wall can wash uranium out of a crust, which makes it look older than it is. They want a second, independent dating method before accepting Neanderthal painters.6

The question is still open. Either way, the Muna stencil, which its discoverers attribute to modern humans, is now older than the disputed Spanish dates.1

Sources for this page

Every number on this page comes from one of these. How we check.

  1. Oktaviana, A. A., Joannes-Boyau, R. and others (2026). Rock art from at least 67,800 years ago in Sulawesi. Nature 650, 652–656. doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09968-yUsed for: The hand stencil in Liang Metanduno, Muna, dated to at least 67,800 years ago. Checked 11 November 2026.
  2. Oktaviana, A. A., Joannes-Boyau, R. and others (2024). Narrative cave art in Indonesia by 51,200 years ago. Nature 631, 814–818. doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07541-7Used for: The painted scene at Leang Karampuang, Sulawesi, at least 51,200 years old. Checked 11 November 2026.
  3. Aubert, M., Setiawan, P. and others (2018). Palaeolithic cave art in Borneo. Nature 564, 254–257. doi.org/10.1038/s41586-018-0679-9Used for: Lubang Jeriji Saléh, Borneo: an animal painting at least 40,000 years old and hand stencils at least 37,200 years old. Checked 11 November 2026.
  4. Pike, A. W. G., Hoffmann, D. L. and others (2012). U-series dating of Paleolithic art in 11 caves in Spain. Science 336, 1409–1413. doi.org/10.1126/science.1219957Used for: El Castillo: a red disc at least 40,800 years old and a hand stencil at least 37,300 years old; how uranium-series dating gives a minimum age. Checked 11 November 2026.
  5. Hoffmann, D. L., Standish, C. D. and others (2018). U-Th dating of carbonate crusts reveals Neandertal origin of Iberian cave art. Science 359, 912–915. doi.org/10.1126/science.aap7778Used for: The claim that paintings in three Spanish caves, including hand stencils at Maltravieso, are older than 64,000 years and so made by Neanderthals. Checked 11 November 2026.
  6. White, R., Bosinski, G. and others (2020). Still no archaeological evidence that Neanderthals created Iberian cave art. Journal of Human Evolution 144, 102640. doi.org/10.1016/j.jhevol.2019.102640Used for: The case against the 2018 Spanish dates. Checked 11 November 2026.
  7. UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Cueva de las Manos, Río Pinturas (inscribed 1999). whc.unesco.org/en/list/936Used for: Cueva de las Manos, Patagonia, and its hand stencils. Checked 11 November 2026.
  8. Natural Earth, 1:110m and 1:50m land, public domain, via the world-atlas package by Mike Bostock (ISC licence). www.naturalearthdata.com/Used for: Every coastline drawn on this site. Checked 11 November 2026.