Most discernible animal images appear to represent the island’s largest endemic land mammals: suids and dwarf bovids (anoas, Bubalus sp.) ( 11). The animal outlines are typically infilled with irregular patterns of painted lines and dashes rather than recognizable anatomical detail solid infill is documented, but rare. The artists used somewhat simplified forms of outline representation to depict animals in profile. In most instances, animal images were executed in a single color (typically red or purple/mulberry) using brushwork and/or fingertips. The pre-Austronesian rock art is characterized by hand stencils and figurative animal paintings. If the oldest published dates for Madjedbebe ( 3) are acceptable, then Homo sapiens may have reached Sulawesi up to 69 to 59 ka. In some models of early human settlement in Sahul, the large Sulawesi landmass would have been the first “stop” on a series of ocean crossings through northern Wallacea to the western tip of New Guinea ( 5).
There is some controversy, however, over the validity of the latter age estimates ( 4), which are based on recent excavations at Madjedbebe rock shelter in northern Australia ( 3). They were also possibly in Pleistocene Australia–New Guinea (Sahul) by 69 to 59 ka ( 3). AMH appear to have been established in mainland Southeast Asia (Sunda) by 73 to 63 ka ( 2). It is not yet certain when anatomically modern humans (AMH) first colonized Sulawesi. Dated to ~194 to 118 thousand years (ka), these artifacts may reflect initial colonization by an as-yet unidentified archaic hominin ( 1). The Talepu findings comprise in situ stone artifacts associated with fossils of extinct terrestrial megafauna ( 1). The earliest archaeological evidence is from Talepu, a Middle Pleistocene site in the south of the island ( 1). Sulawesi has a long history of human occupation. Sulawesi is the largest island (~174,000 km 2) in Wallacea, a biogeographically distinct zone of oceanic islands situated between continental Asia and Australia ( Fig.
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