Project Description
2024-2028
Humans store information outside of their minds. This capacity for information encoding is reflected in symbols and written language, and it underlies artificial computing systems. It is a hallmark of human evolution. Traces of this capacity have "fossilized" in the archaeological record reaching back into the Paleolithic of c. 400 000 to 11 000 thousand years ago. The EVINE project (Evolution of Visual INformation Encoding) proposes to digitize large scale samples of paleolithic finds, and to compare their information encoding potential to ancient and modern writing. This enables us to pinpoint the transitions in information encoding from the first signs to the information age.
This project is funded by an ERC Starting Grant (ERC, EVINE, 101117111).
Visiting Museums in Vienna and Mistelbach
February 17-27, 2025Ewa Dutkiewicz and Christian Bentz visit the Österreichisches Archäologisches Institut (ÖAI) and the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien (NHMW), as well as the Mamuz Museum in Mistelbach for primary data acquisition in the context of SignBase. Many thanks to Marc Händel (ÖAI), Caroline Posch (NHMW), and Barbara Schuller (Mamuz Museum) for hosting us!
Workshop on Icons in Transition
November 2024Christian Bentz and Ewa Dutkiewicz gave a talk about "Information Encoding in the Paleolithic" at the Workshop on "Icons in Transition", organized by Marion Benz, Barbara Helwing, and Ewa Dutkiewicz as part of the World Neolithic Congress, Harran University, in Şanlıurfa, Turkey.
