At www.dutchnews.nl/news/archives/2018/02/oldest-dutch-work-of-art-found-at… …. the oldest Dutch work of art goes back to the Mesolithic era – dating from around 13,500 years ago and consisting of a severed bison bone dredged up from the bottom of the North Sea. The bone was covered in a geometrical design, mostly zig zags. What is more important is the admission by archaeologists they did not record artifacts from the North Sea bed until recently. They were compartmentalised as Out of Context – and archaeologically invalid as a useful item. How much stuff has been ignored because of this policy?
Still in the Mesolithic era we have a story from www.livescience.com/61736-ancient-heads-on-stakes.html … 8000 year old skulls, some impaled on sharpened wooden stakes, have been found at a burial site in Sweden. It is reputed that they were placed in what had been a lake – now a bog encroached by woodland. Were they dedicated offerings to the gods of rising waters? The short piece suggests a variety of cultic ideas – but all guesswork. Nobody knows. Why.