Editor's note: The Makapansgat pebble, or the pebble of many faces, is a jasperite chunk naturally chipped, resembling a crude construct of a human face. It was found in a dolerite cave in Limpopo, South Africa, in 1925, far away from any possible natural source. It's considered possible that the australopithecine recognized the symbolic face and thus saved the piece, carrying it back to their camp and treasuring it among their rudimentary possessions. If true, this would mark the earliest known example of symbolic thinking.
The Makapansgat Pebble of Many Faces Two eyes hollowed out like someone who has seen too much, drawn cheeks and a mouth that might scream. She looks like a toothless old woman still gathering herself every morning to lift eggs out of the nests, pull grasses off the plains, bathe in the light. Or he looks like the king deposed, the ape defeated, still certain that his chin juts out. He is the child we tried to leave behind and couldn't. We carried him quivering to this cave. We came upright on slender legs through the late Pliocene. Our brains almost the same as your brains. We did not chisel out these jasperite faces, but art, we found, we carried with us. Deborah Bacharach Deborah Bacharach is the author of After I Stop Lying (Cherry Grove Collections, 2015). Her work has appeared in Literary Mama, The Antigonish Review, The Southampton Review, and the Inquisitive Eater amony many others. Find out more about her at DeborahBacharach.com.
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November 2023
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