Stock character representative of primitive humans
"Cavepeople" redirects here. Not to be confused with
CAVE people
.
The
caveman
is a
stock character
representative of primitive humans in the
Paleolithic
. The popularization of the type dates to the early 20th century, when
Neanderthals
were influentially described as "
simian
" or "
ape
-like" by
Marcellin Boule
[1]
and
Arthur Keith
.
[2]
The term "caveman" has its
taxonomic
equivalent in the now-obsolete
binomial classification
of
Homo troglodytes
(Linnaeus
,
1758
).
[3]
Characteristics
[
edit
]
Cavemen are typically portrayed as wearing shaggy
animal hides
, and capable of
cave painting
like
behaviorally modern humans
of the
last glacial period
. They are often shown armed with rocks, cattle bone clubs, spears, or sticks with rocks tied to them, and are portrayed as unintelligent, easily frightened, and aggressive. Typically, they have a low pitched rough voice and make vocalisations such as "ooga-booga" and grunts or speak using simple phrases.
Popular culture
also frequently represents cavemen as living with, or alongside of,
dinosaurs
, even though non-avian dinosaurs became extinct at the end of the
Cretaceous period
, 66 million years before the emergence of
Homo sapiens
. The era typically associated with the archetype is the
Paleolithic Era
, sometimes referred to as the
Stone Age
, though the Paleolithic is but one part of the Stone Age. This era extends from more than 2 million years into the past until between 40,000 and 5,000 years before the present (i.e., from around 2,000
kya
to between 40 and 5 kya).
[
citation needed
]
The image of these people living in caves arises from the fact that caves are where the preponderance of
artifacts
have been found from European Stone Age cultures. However, this most likely reflects the degree of preservation that caves provide over the millennia, rather than an indication of them being a typical form of shelter. Until the last glacial period, the great majority of humans did not live in caves, as nomadic
hunter-gatherer
tribes lived in a variety of temporary structures, such as tents
[4]
and wooden huts (e.g., at
Ohalo
). A few genuine cave dwellings did exist, however, such as at
Mount Carmel
in
Israel
.
[5]
Stereotypical cavemen have traditionally been depicted wearing smock-like garments made from the skins of animals and held up by a shoulder strap on one side. Stereotypical cavewomen are similarly depicted, but sometimes with slimmer proportions and bones tied up in their hair. They are also depicted carrying large clubs approximately conical in shape. They often have grunt-like names, such as "Ugg" and "Zog".
[6]
History
[
edit
]
Caveman-like heraldic "
wild men
" were found in European and African iconography for hundreds of years. During the
Middle Ages
, these beings were generally depicted in art and literature as bearded and covered in hair, and often wielding
clubs
and dwelling in caves. While wild men were always depicted as living outside of civilization, it was not always clearly whether they were human or non-human.
[7]
In Sir
Arthur Conan Doyle
's
The Lost World
(1912), ape-men are depicted in a fight with modern humans.
How the First Letter Was Written
and
How the Alphabet was Made
are two of
Rudyard Kipling
's
Just So Stories
(1902) featuring a group of cave-people.
Edgar Rice Burroughs
adapted this idea for
The Land That Time Forgot
(1918). A genre of cavemen films emerged, typified by
D. W. Griffith
's
Man's Genesis
(1912); they inspired
Charles Chaplin
's satiric take
[8]
in
His Prehistoric Past
(1914), as well as
Brute Force
(1914),
The Cave Man
(1912), and later,
Cave Man
(1934). From the descriptions, Griffith's characters cannot talk, and use sticks and stones for weapons, while the hero of
Cave Man
is a
Tarzanesque
figure who fights dinosaurs.
Captain Caveman and the Teen Angels
(1977-1980), is an animated comedy depicting cavemen as being hairy and carrying clubs.
[
citation needed
]
Griffith's
Brute Force
represents one of the earliest portrayals of cavemen and dinosaurs together, with its depiction of a
Ceratosaurus
.
[9]
[10]
The film reinforced the incorrect notion that non-avian dinosaurs co-existed with prehistoric humans.
[10]
The anachronistic combination of cavemen with dinosaurs eventually became a
cliche
, and has often been intentionally invoked for comedic effect. The comic strips
B.C.
,
Alley Oop
, the Spanish comic franchise
Mortadelo y Filemon
, and occasionally
The Far Side
and
Gogs
portray "cavemen" with dinosaurs.
Gary Larson
, in his 1989 book
The Prehistory of the Far Side
, stated he once felt that he needed to confess his cartooning sins in this regard: "O Father, I Have Portrayed Primitive Man and Dinosaurs In The Same Cartoon".
[11]
The animated series
The Flintstones
, a spoof on family sitcoms, portrays the Flintstones even using dinosaurs,
pterosaurs
and prehistoric mammals as tools, household appliances, vehicles, and construction equipment.
[12]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"Ape-like or human? Disagreement erupts over Neanderthal posture"
.
Cosmos
. 25 February 2019. Archived from
the original
on 2020-08-13
. Retrieved
2020-04-13
.
- ^
"Early Man in Palestine"
.
Nature
.
129
(3268): 898. 1932-06-01.
Bibcode
:
1932Natur.129R.898.
.
doi
:
10.1038/129898b0
.
ISSN
1476-4687
.
- ^
Isabella, Jude (2013-12-05).
"The Caveman's Home Was Not a Cave"
.
Nautilus
. Retrieved
2020-04-13
.
- ^
Moore, Jerry D. (2012).
The Prehistory of Home
. University of California Press.
- ^
Bar-Am, Aviva (2009-08-02).
"Carmel Caves - How to meet a caveman"
.
The Jerusalem Post
. Retrieved
2019-10-18
.
- ^
DePaolo, Charles (2000-11-01).
"Wells, Golding, and Auel: Representing the Neanderthal"
.
Science Fiction Studies #82 (Volume 27, Part 3)
. Retrieved
2019-05-08
.
- ^
Yamamoto, Dorothy (2000). "The Wild Man 1: Figuring Identity".
The Boundaries of the Human in Medieval English Literature
. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press. pp. 153?155.
ISBN
978-0-19-818674-8
.
OCLC
42912060
.
- ^
Stills from
Man's Genesis
Archived
2008-07-20 at the
Wayback Machine
and
His Prehistoric Past
show that Chaplin still has his bowler hat.
- ^
Hawkes, Rebecca (2015-11-24).
"Costumed pigs, iguanas and Raquel Welch: the evolution of movie dinosaurs"
.
The Telegraph
.
Archived
from the original on 2022-01-12
. Retrieved
2020-05-15
.
- ^
a
b
Glut, Donald F.
; Brett-Surman, Michael K. (1997). "Dinosaurs and the media".
The Complete Dinosaur
. Bloomington and Indianapolis:
Indiana University Press
. pp.
675?706
.
ISBN
978-0-253-33349-0
.
- ^
Larson, Gary
(1989).
The Prehistory of The Far Side
. Andrews McMeel.
ISBN
0-8362-1851-5
.
- ^
Blake, Heidi (2010-09-30).
"The Flintstones' 50th anniversary: 10 wackiest Bedrock inventions"
.
Daily Telegraph
.
Archived
from the original on 2022-01-12.
External links
[
edit
]