Page 29 - J. C. Turner - History and Science of Knots

16 History and Science of Knots

Conclusion
Knots and cordage have been used by humans for a very long time. There
is good evidence of them from non-perishable artefacts of up to more than
300 000 years ago (see the Summary Table, after the References). And there
is good reason to believe that they might have been used with wholly perishable
materials for a long time before that. But there was no evidence at all from
artefacts or art of just what knots were used, until actual samples of knotted
cord, preserved by some unusual circumstance, were found (for examples see
Chapter 2).
The earliest evidence available suggests that binding knots and lashings
of some kind were used, and evidence for bends is nearly as old. The early use
of hitches would seem very likely; stopper knots, and fixed or (particularly)
sliding loop knots, might also have been in very early use, but we would expect
specific indications to be very rare and hard to recognise.

References
1. Z. A. Abramova, Paleoliticheskoe iskussivo na territorii SSSR
(Akademiya Nauk SSSR, Moscow, 1962).
2. P. Anderson, `A microwear analysis of selected flint artefacts from the
Mousterian of Southwest France'. Lithic Technology 9(2) (1980) 33.
3. C. W. Ashley, The Ashley Book of Knots (Doubleday, New York, 1944).
4. R. G. Bednarik, `More to Palaeolithic females than meets the eye',
Rock Art Research 7 (1990) 133.
5. R. G. Bednarik, `Palaeoart and archaeological myths',
Cambridge Archaeological Journal 2 (1992) 27.
6. R. G. Bednarik, `Wall markings of the cave bear', Studies in Speleology
9 (1993) 51.
7. R. G. Bednarik, `Art origins', Anthropos 89 (1994) 169.
8. R. G. Bednarik, `Concept-mediated hominid marking behaviour in the
Lower Palaeolithic', Current Anthropology 36 (in press).
9. J. Birdsell, `The recalibration of a paradigm for the first peopling of
Greater Australia', in Sunda and Sahul, eds. J. Allen, J. Golson and
R. Jones (Academic Press, London, 1977) 113.
10. P. I. Boriskovski, Paleolit SSSR (Izdatelatvo Nauka, Moscow, 1984)
134.
11. L. Chen, Chinese Knotting (Echo, Taipei, 1982).
12. R. Cosgrove in G. Burenhult (ed.) The First Humans (University of
Queensland Press, St Lucia, 1993) 167.