Upper Paleolithic Symbol Systems of the Russian Plain: Cognitive and Comparative Analysis [and Comments and Reply]

A microscopic examination of the engraved and carved artifacts from the Upper Paleolithic of the Russian plain in Soviet collections has revealed the presence of a number of complex symbol systems and modes of symbol use. These systems have not previously been noted or studied. The iconography has been found to be different from that in contemporaneous symbol systems in the Western European Upper Paleolithic, but the basic modes and strategies of symbol use were nevertheless comparable or similar. The data raise a number of profound questions concerning (a) the origin or origins of early Homo sapiens sapiens symbol usage and the possible early dispersal or diffusion of certain cognitive and cultural modes of symbol use, (b) the possible near-iconic nature of the earliest H. sapiens sapiens symbol systems, and (c) the relevance of these evolving systems for those symbolic traditions that persisted and developed in the post-Wurm. It seems that at least some of these systems in the Eastern and Western Upper Paleolithic were aspects of a water-related symbolism and therefore referred to a phenomenological reality as valid and persistent as the realities referred to in Upper Paleolithic images of animals and females.