The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Institute of Archaeology, Jerusalem, Israel.
CNRS, UAR 3132 Centre de Recherche Français à Jérusalem (CRFJ), Jerusalem, Israel.
PLoS One. 2023 Oct 25;18(10):e0292264. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0292264. eCollection 2023.
Decorating the living space, objects, body and clothes with colour is a widespread human practice. While the habitual use of red mineral pigments (such as iron-oxide, e.g., ochre) by anatomically modern humans started in Africa about 140,000 years ago, the earliest documentation of the use of organic plant or animal-based red pigments is known from only 6,000 years ago. Here, we report the oldest reliable evidence of organic red pigment use 15,000 years ago by the first sedentary hunter-gatherers in the Levant. SEM-EDS and Raman Spectroscopy analyses of 10 red-stained shell beads enabled us to detect and describe the use of a colourant made of Rubiaceae plants roots (Rubia spp., Asperula spp., Gallium spp.) to colour personal adornments from the Early Natufian of Kebara cave, Mount Carmel, Israel. This adds a previously unknown behavioural aspect of Natufian societies, namely a well-established tradition of non-dietary plant processing at the beginning of the sedentary lifestyle. Through a combined multidisciplinary approach, our study broadens the perspectives on the ornamental practices and the chaînes opératoires of pigmenting materials during a crucial period in human history.
用颜色装饰生活空间、物品、身体和衣服是一种普遍的人类行为。虽然解剖学上的现代人大约在 14 万年前开始习惯性地使用红色矿物质颜料（如氧化铁，例如赭石），但最早记录到有机植物或动物来源的红色颜料的使用是在 6000 年前。在这里，我们报告了在黎凡特地区最早的定居狩猎采集者 15000 年前使用有机红色颜料的最可靠证据。通过对 10 个红色染色贝壳珠的扫描电子显微镜-能谱（SEM-EDS）和拉曼光谱分析，我们能够检测到并描述了一种由茜草科植物根（茜草属、獐牙菜属、金缕梅属）制成的着色剂的使用，这种着色剂用于给以色列卡梅尔山凯巴拉洞的早期纳图夫人的个人饰品上色。这增加了纳图夫人社会以前未知的行为方面，即在开始定居生活时就已经确立了对非饮食植物进行加工的传统。通过综合多学科的方法，我们的研究拓宽了在人类历史的关键时期对装饰性实践和颜料材料加工链的视角。
