Archaeologist Pietro Gaietto has found what he believes to be the earliest evidence of art. “Gaietto believes the sculpture is 200,000 years old, and would have been used in rituals. He says it would have been made by an extinct species of human called Homo erectus, of which there is evidence in the region. Gaietto’s claims are controversial because hominids such as Homo erectus are not thought to have been capable of the symbolic thought needed to create art.”