Handprints from the Past

Abstract

Hands are frequently represented in cave and cliff art found in various locations worldwide. Most well known are the handprints found in caves in southern Europe, primarily France and Spain as well as Italy, Portugal, Germany and the Balkans. Handprints are also found outside Europe, for instance in Australia, North America and South America. The most common are so-called negative handprints, where coloured pigment has been sprayed around a hand placed on a cliff wall to produce a ‘negative’ hand image. In some locations, the images show mutilated hands lacking one or more fingers. The meaning of the hand images is not clear, but they may have been important components of religious rituals. In Sweden hands are frequently depicted in rock carvings in the county of Bohuslän in the southwest part the country. A spectacular rock carving from the late Bronze Age 3,000–3,500 years ago, portraying a man and a woman unified by a large joint hand, symbolises ‘the sacred union’ between the god and goddess of fertility. This carving, like a large number of additional carvings at the site, is covered by heavy vegetation, making them available only to a few experts in the field.