At 67,800-years-old, These Handprints Just Discovered in Indonesia Are Oldest Example of Rock Art

– credit, Aubert, Brumm, et al.

The discovery of stylized handprints dating back at least 67,800 years in a limestone cave in Indonesia has broken the country’s own record for the world’s oldest-known example of rock art.

It provides direct evidence that humans have been crossing the sea intentionally for nearly 70,000 years, as Man traveled from the Asian continent across Australasia to the land Down Under and beyond.

Adhi Agus Oktaviana, a researcher at the BRIN Research Center for Archaeometry, revealed that the minimum age of the rock art is 16,600 years older than the previously discovered rock art from Muna Island, which GNN reported on in 2024.

This rock art is also 1,100 years older than the handprints from Spain that were previously associated with Neanderthals and had long been considered the oldest cave art in the world, and 22,200 years older than the depiction of the Sulawesi warty pig, discovered on the same island as the other two, in 2021.

In other words, in the last five years, 3 of the 4 oldest cave artworks ever found on Earth were identified on the same small island off Sulawesi, Indonesia.

Oktaviana explained that to determine the age of this rock art, the research team applied the laser-ablation uranium-series (LA-U-series) dating technique to the microscopic calcite layer covering the cave paintings and produced a date that would be the earliest possible production time of the handprints.

– credit, Maxime Aubert

As news releases that regarded the previous two discoveries stated, the artworks elevate Indonesia to one of the most important centers in the early history of symbolic art and modern human sea exploration in the world.

This discovery confirms that Wallacea, a sunken landmass that exists above sea level today as the Indo-Pacific, was not only a route to Australia, but also a major habitat for early modern humans. It also reinforces the long chronological model, which states that humans reached the Sahul landmass (Australia–Papua) at least 65,000 years ago.

“It is very likely that the creators of these paintings were part of a population that later spread further east and eventually reached Australia,” said Oktaviana. “This research provides the oldest direct evidence of modern humans on the northern migration route to Sahul, which involved sea exploration between Kalimantan (Borneo) and Papua—an area that remains relatively unexplored archaeologically.”

Meanwhile, Professor Adam Brumm from the Australian Research Centre for Human Evolution (ARCHE), Griffith University, said that the handprints found in the rock art on Muna Island also have globally unique characteristics, with modifications that narrow the shape of the fingers to resemble claws, reflecting a mature symbolic expression. According to him, the symbolic meaning of this narrowing of the finger shape is still speculative.

“However, this art could symbolize the idea that humans and animals have a very close relationship. This is already evident in the earliest paintings in Sulawesi, including at least one scene that we interpret as a representation of a half-human, half-animal creature,” he explained.With the discovery of Pleistocene rock art sites in the karst region of Sulawesi, this brings a great responsibility in preserving irreplaceable cultural heritage. Therefore, researchers are calling for the protection of karst areas containing ancient rock art sites to be an integral part of spatial planning and natural resource management policies. At 67,800-years-old, These Handprints Just Discovered in Indonesia Are Oldest Example of Rock Art

Read More........→February 06, 2026

He Beached an Old Cruise Ship and Turned it into $18 Million Beachfront Hotel with Love

released by Doulos Phos Ship Hotel

By Andy Corbley, Sep 02, 2025, It was the oldest passenger ship still floating: he turned it into an unforgettable terrestrial hotel experience.

Long since declared unseaworthy, the MV Doulos Phos is now the 5-star Doulos Phos Ship Hotel at the Bintan resort reclamation project in Indonesia.

But if you’re imagining the ship to be merely a prop, thank again. Her new owner, as nautically enthused as an interview with CNN demonstrated him to be, endeavored to keep intact every ounce of heritage that was possible to preserve, from the defunct engine room to the porthole windows.

“If I didn’t have this project, maybe I’d have a Ferrari and a Lamborghini at home, and I’d be sailing around the world every year with my family,” 74-year-old Eric Saw, a devout Christian Singaporean multi-millionaire, and the owner (captain, maybe?) of the boat and the hotel told CNN.

That project took 15 years and $18 million to complete, along with countless headaches and many inches of nails bitten down in anxiety. It was journey that barely holds a candle to the vessel’s long history.

It was 1914, just two years after Titanic sunk when SS Medina rolled off the shipyard in Newport News, Virginia. Over a career spanning 100 years, she transported agricultural goods, then military personnel during the First World War, then passengers again under the name SS Roma. In the mid-20th century, she swapped her steam engine for a diesel one, and her name (again) to MS Franca C. and set sail as a cruise liner.

Her final conversion came when she was purchased as a missionary vessel and floating library in 1977, and renamed the MV Doulos. She docked at over 100 countries, sailed hundreds of thousands of nautical miles, and was at one point the oldest operating passenger vessel on the seas.

But time ends all romances, and with a mountain of maintenance needs that no one would pay for, she was drydocked in Singapore to await bids for new ownership, 4 years shy of her 100th birthday.

Eric Saw already ran a three-story restaurant inside a Mississippi-style paddle steamer, and felt “a calling from god” to buy and repurpose the ship into a new line of work.

After three years of paying dock fees for the vessel, Saw zeroed in on a place of rest on Bintan island in Indonesia. He was offered 3 acres of reclaimed land; he requested that it form the shape of an anchor.

In October 2015, at 101 years-of-age, the newly-renamed MV Doulos Phos, or “servant of light” in Greek, embarked upon her final voyage from the island of Batam to Bintan. There she would rest upon a bed of concrete undergirded with piles extending 130 feet into the bedrock below the seabed.

Inside, the small crew and passenger cabins which were crammed and poorly lit were expanded, but some were left as-is for adventurous visitors. Elevators and fire escapes and other modern building requirements were installed to meet building codes and regs, along with modern electrical and plumbing.

released by Doulos Phos Ship Hotel

Yet every vestige of heritage possible to save was retained, including the four life boats, which still hang from chains along her midship, and tons of material including the original rivets which held her hull together as welding hadn’t been pioneered in shipbuilding in 1914.

Perhaps because he saw it as a mission from god, Saw takes a salary of $1.00 a year, while all operating profit is donated to charitable causes—a servant of the light, in name and nature. He Beached an Old Cruise Ship and Turned it into $18 Million Beachfront Hotel with Love

Read More........→November 12, 2025