Categorisation of Prehistoric Art Objects on the Example of Finno-Ugric area
Enn Ernits · Folklore Electronic Journal of Folklore · 2001
Art in the general sense includes verbal art, music, dancing, archi-tecture, applied art, decorative art and visual art, but in the nar-rower sense includes only the latter four, encompassing thus com-munication through visual means. Artistic expression from the time prior to recorded history is called prehistoric art. It is very ancient indeed. Stone figurines dating back more than 100,000 years have been discovered in the surroundings of Hamburg, Germany.1 The emergence of art in the distant past has been subject to diverse explanations. Author of the present article agrees with those who assume that “religion and the roots of what later became art and science merged in the spiritual culture of primitive man ” (Kangilaski 1997: 25). This enables us to discern the undifferentiated syncretic roots of primitive religion, art and sciences that provide an inter-esting research subject for researchers of religious history, art his-tory and the history of particular disciplines (e.g. anatomy, archae-