Vanished! Surprising things missing from ancient art

Charcoal drawings in Chauvet Cave, over 30,000 years old
Credit: Bradshaw Foundation

Look at the image above – many animals – horses, bison, rhinoceros, but typical of so much art, over thousands of years, in many ancient cultures – no plants.

Also largely missing from the art of ancient cultures is the colour blue. While paintings from Ancient Egypt are a famous exception, blue appears rarely in ancient art. Art, here, includes the written. E.g., “blue” is not mentioned once in the writings of Homer. No blue skies, nor seas. Seas, apparently are “wine-dark”!

Different aspects of these phenomena at the links below:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/phenomena/2016/03/02/vanished-the-surprising-things-missing-from-ancient-art/

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2976405/Could-ancestors-blue-Ancient-civilisations-didn-t-perceive-colour-didn-t-word-say-scientists.html

https://www.dunnedwards.com/colors/specs/posts/the-history-and-science-behind-the-color-blue / look back across the history of art things go missing interesting things ancient people word describe color of the sky blue argument colleagues podcast broadcast essay William Gladstone British prime minister 1860s 1880s 1890s Gladstone Homer-philiac loved Homer Homer’s tales read obscure poet’s use of color words Iliad Odyssey Gladstone every instance Homer using color describe blacks whites reds, yellows greens blue it was nowhere to be found Homer skies aren’t blue seas aren’t blue wine-dark blue eyes immortals Tim Howard reporter Gladstone’s essay linguist scholar ancient texts Guy Deutscher Gladstone’s right there is just no word that describes the color blue in Homer’s poems no blue philologist Lazarus Geiger ancient Chinese texts South Asia’s Vedic poems old Icelandic sagas Western Bible ancient classics no or barely any use of blue why no blue explored different theories most plausible sky ancient people didn’t pay it much attention no need distinguish it own descriptive color colour and place ubiquity invisible blue paints invented Egypt blue descriptor buy sell newest missing thing ancients even more basic plants cave paintings Palaeolithic artists drew draw drawing 40,000 years ago hundreds of them Spain France plants galloping horses rippling reindeer cattle rhino animals eat animals chase worship animals lived on plains in forests ate plants no convincing image of grass landscape imagery deer leafy leaf bush leafy things Palaeolithic art bushes trees biologist painter Tony Hopkins sketching rock art no truly ancient representation of plants cave art stays plant free 5,000 years after the end of the Palaeolithic era beginnings of agriculture in the Middle East commerce pops into view explanation animals more vivid more alive animals birth coupling reproduction plants more mysterious narrative fetish nobody drew a plant on a cave wall single image possible plant carved on a bone found cave Gironde region of France dates back 15,000 B.C. convincing picture specific potentially identifiable flower four possible blossoms passable impression sprig bilberry crowberry four blossoms flowers sleepy birds mouths open convincing picture plant birds heads necks ancient ancestors ate berries fruits gathered grass bedding animals foraging forests meadows mountains gathered hunted hunter gatherer hunters hunted sacred walls gatherers gathered very curious omission /