The earliest systematic depictions of plant motifs in human history have been discovered following an in-depth analysis of ancient pottery by Hebrew University of Jerusalem specialists Yosef Garfinkel and Sarah Krulwich.
The floral ornaments are dated by them to the period of the Halafian archaeological culture in Northern Mesopotamia (approximately 6200-5500 BC). And it is not only about “flowers”, but about the first manifestations of complex mathematical thinking.
While early prehistoric art mainly depicted humans and animals, Halafian pottery reflects the moment when the attention of ancient craftsmen turned to the plant world – flowers, saplings, shrubs, trees and branches, reports Noi.mdreading .
At 29 archaeological sites, the researchers recorded hundreds of plant ornaments made with great care, both naturalistic, executed with botanical precision, and abstract.
The detailed images of flowers, shrubs, branches and trees contain manifestations of complex geometric and arithmetical thinking. Thus, many objects are decorated with images of flowers with a number of petals that increases in geometric progression: 4, 8, 16, 32, 64.
According to scientists, this phenomenon expresses an intuitive form of mathematical thinking, which manifested itself a thousand years before the appearance of the first mathematical texts in Sumer, and a cognitive change related to rural life and expressed through a growing awareness of geometric organization, symmetry and aesthetics.
