By Frederick L. Coolidge, Professor, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, USA; and Apeksha Srivastava, Doctoral Candidate, Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, India.
“Archaeologists must solidly define what a symbol is …” (Coolidge, 2023).
Archaeology is a field that traces the human past through material remains. Symbols are an important part of this process and broadly represent a meaning or an idea for something within a culture. However, the terms symbol, symbolism, and/or symbolic thinking are rarely, if ever, defined in the archaeological literature. Further, this literature is virtually dominated by polymath Charles Sanders Peirce’s sign delineations among icons, indexes, and symbols. An icon, such as a photograph, physically resembles the represented concept or object. An index highlights the evidence of the concept or object being represented, such as an image of smoke to indicate fire. A symbol has no resemblance between the concept or object being represented and the sign’s form (words, sound, facial expression, etc.). Symbol connections are learned, as in the case of sounds, numbers, alphabets, and words. Peirce (who died in 1914) differentiated among these three kinds of signs, which have no relationship to cognitive complexity, in the late 1800s. However, many archaeologists act as if symbols represent the highest level of cognitive complexity. Yet, the simplest organisms like flatworms or cognitively more complex animals like dogs can be classically conditioned to recognize them. Specifically, a dog can learn a bell is a symbol of food when there is no actual resemblance between the bell and the food. Further, Pavlov found that dogs could respond to buzzers and other stimuli heralding food.
The point of this article is that the term symbol should no longer be discussed in Peircian terms in archaeology. It is imperative to recognize that symbols in archaeology must be interpreted in terms of a cognitive hierarchy. Thus, a bell absolutely qualifies as a symbol, but it is the most basic type of symbol in terms of cognitive complexity. Recently, Coolidge et al. (2024) presented this argument in a chapter of The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Archaeology. In the chapter, he delineated three levels of symbols in terms of cognitive complexity. The basic level involves either Pavlov’s classical conditioning (bells and dogs) or operant conditioning (behaviors reinforced or punished in the presence of stimuli). Coolidge proposed the intermediate level of symbolization would build upon the basic level but higher levels of cognitive complexity might also be involved. A good example might be the Bruniquel stalagmite stone ring found about 370 yards within a French cave. The ring was intentionally formed and dates to about 176,000 years ago, which means it has to be attributed to Neandertals, as Homo sapiens may not have entered Europe until about 55,000 years ago. The archaeologists who discovered this stone ring were far more cautious in their interpretation than the subsequent media attention. The archaeologists claimed it might have been a step toward modern thinking rather than claiming it was fully symbolic, represented syntactic language, or abstract thinking. Thus, in Coolidge et al.’s hierarchy of symbolization, the Bruniquel ring can be understood at an intermediate level of cognitive complexity.
The third and highest level of cognitive symbolic complexity is the fully immersed symbolic thinking (FIST). Coolidge et al. proposed that FIST requires basic learning principles (e.g., classical and operant conditioning), full theory of mind (ToM), and enhanced working memory. ToM involves one’s ability to understand one’s own mental states and those of others and to use this information to understand and monitor self and other’s human behavior. Working memory is a multicomponent cognitive model critical for reasoning, decision-making, planning, and inhibition. In their book chapter, Coolidge et al. presented three pieces of evidence that support the hypothesis that FIST only appeared in the last 100,000 years, only in Homo sapiens and not in Neandertals: paleoneurological, genomic, and archaeological.
Paleoneurology primarily involves the study of the skull fossil evidence for brain evolution. It is well established that there was a parietal lobe expansion of the human brain within the last 100,000 years in Homo sapiens. The parietal lobes are responsible for interpreting sensory information (e.g., touch, smell, taste) and play a role in creating mental maps for representing one’s surroundings and concepts of self and others. There was also an expansion of the cerebellum in Homo sapiens compared to Neandertals. The cerebellum is known to tweak and refine thoughts, just like motor movements. Additionally, the olfactory bulbs that process the sense of smell became larger in Homo sapiens compared to Neandertals, and a recent study of the difference in odorant receptor genes between modern Homo sapiens and the last Neandertals concluded that the former’s sense of smell may have been three times more acute. Sense of smell has been strongly implicated in immunological responses and mate selection, among other functions.
At least eight genes are known to regulate brain size, and five underwent rapid evolution during primate and human evolution. A variant of one of the five, MCPH1, evolved under strong positive selection in the last 90,000 years. Suspected repercussions included structural, behavioral, or cognitive aspects. A variant of the gene TKTL1 has been found to be involved in a greater neurogenesis (the process by which neurons are formed) in Homo sapiens’ frontal lobes (the front part of the brain) than in Neandertals.
Finally, the archaeological evidence for FIST is overwhelmingly present for Homo sapiens within the last 50,000 years but not for Neandertals. The earliest indisputable archaeological evidence for FIST comes from the Holenstein-stadle figurine, dating to 42,000 years ago in a cave in Southwestern Germany. It is an ivory statue, about 12 inches tall, of a female cave lion’s head on a human body. Also, there is indisputable evidence of FIST in Homo sapiens from the highly ritualized Sungir (Russia) burials of two juveniles about 32,000 years ago, who were covered with over 10,000 decorative beads, ornamental ivory discs, and ivory spears. Finally, sophisticated depictive cave art appeared as early as 37,000 years ago, depicting many kinds of animals and other drawings and etchings.
Homo sapiens were not superior to Neandertals. In terms of humanity, they were absolutely equal. These two human types were nearly identical in their genomes, and there is no question that many of their general behaviors were similar. However, Neandertals went extinct about 30,000 years ago, and we did not. There were some critical DNA differences resulting in brain differences (e.g., larger parietal lobes, cerebellum, olfactory bulbs, etc.), which means it is highly likely that the resulting behavioral consequences contributed to the survival of Homo sapiens. The archaeological evidence for FIST is present only for Homo sapiens. Neandertals may have scratched a hashtag-like symbol in a cave in Gibraltar, painted their bodies in ochre, and worn teeth or claw pendants, but there is nothing in the archaeological evidence to date that is unquestionably representative of FIST. Can the latter behaviors be interpreted as an intermediate level of symbolism? Absolutely, yes! However, to argue, as some have done, that it represents a fully syntactic modern language or abstract thinking may be a failure to understand that symbolism must be interpreted in terms of cognitive complexity, and Peircian semiotics (signs) must finally be laid to rest when interpreting archaeological artifacts.
References
Coolidge, F. L., Overmann, K. A., & Wynn, T. (2024). On the Problem of the Interpretation of Symbols and Symbolism in Archaeology. In T. Wynn, K. A. Overmann, & F. L. Coolidge (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Archaeology. Oxford University Press.
login
who are we?
contact us
qosheapp
Toi Staff
Gideon Levy
Belen Fernandez
Rami G Khouri
Mort Laitner
Donald Low
Ali Fathollah-Nejad
Nikkei Editorial
visit website
