Digital Collections | AMNH - Neanderthal Flintworkers, Le Moustier Cavern, Dordogne, France

Selected

Critical/Foundational support for this service is provided by the Leon Levy Foundation as part of the Shelby White & Leon Levy Archive Initiative at the American Museum of Natural History Library

American Museum of Natural History
200 Central Park West
New York, NY 10024-5192

GOTTESMAN RESEARCH LIBRARY

Neanderthal Flintworkers

art-survey1148-knight

Browse Library & Archives

Conceptually similar

Cro-Magnon Artists of Southern France - post restoration

ptc-5375

Cro-Magnon Artists of Southern France

ls-262-019

Neanderthal Flintworkers

ls-336-030

Cro-Magnon Artists of Southern France - pre-restoration

ptc-6675

Neanderthal cave

ls-262-020

Cro-Magnon Artists of Southern France

322602

Neanderthal Man

19545

Neanderthal Man

17281

The Neolithic Stag Hunters

ptc-604

Coryphodons

ptc-866

Phenacodus

ptc-867

The Neolith Stag Hunters

37952

Ichthyosaurus

ptc-1013

Patriofelis and crocodile prey

100219817

Hyracodon

ptc-2433

Dryptosaurus (Leaping Laelaps)

100205624

Borophagus

ptc-2436

Tylosaurus dyspelor

ptc-2425

Woolly mammoth and hunter

100219465

Hoplophoneus

ptc-994

Tags

Anthropology

Physical Anthropology

Prehistoric peoples

Restoration painting

Tools

Asset ID ptc-618

Title Neanderthal Flintworkers, Le Moustier Cavern, Dordogne, France

Description This painting of a Neanderthal family is one of nine large murals produced for the Hall of the Age of Man, which opened at the American Museum of Natural History in the early 1920s. Knight creates a scene at Le Moustier cave, in France, about 40,000 years ago. In 1909, Homo neanderthalensis bones were found at the cave along with stone artifacts, which Knight shows here as they might have been used. The young man at right gathers flint, at center, brandishes a flaked spearpoint as he eyes a woolly rhinoceros in the river below. In the years when Knight, under the guidance of Museum director and paleontologist Henry Fairfield Osborn, was preparing this painting, little was known about the daily habits of our extinct relatives. Neanderthals, who lived in Europe between 200,000 and 30,000 years ago, were generally viewed as primitive brutes. Today, however, scientists think that although Neanderthals did not create art or possess language as we know it, they did live in complex social groups, control fire and bury their dead in simple rituals.

Agent (Role) Knight, Charles Robert, 1874-1953 (Artist)

Date 1920

Artwork/Object Type Paintings

Physical dimensions 173 x 381 cm

Collection/Work Relation AMNH Special Collections, Art Survey No. 1148: Neanderthal Flintworkers, Charles R. Knight, 1920.

External Resource AMNH Library authority record: Knight, Charles Robert, 1874-1953

Alternate Versions Lantern slide: ls-262-020, Lantern slide: ls-336-030, Photographic Negative Number: 39441A

Rights statement Information on rights available at the repository.

Repository American Museum of Natural History

Publication History Czerkas, S.M. and Glut, D.F. 1982. Dinosaurs, mammoths, and cavemen: the art of Charles Knight. New York: Dutton. p. 66.

Suggestions?

Do you have more information or a correction for this item? Please login or register to suggest a metadata edit.

Restrictions