Top image:  Left distal phalanx of Obłazowa Cave from layer VIII. Photographic record of the finding before sampling (from left to right: ulnar, dorsal, palmar, and radial views)   

In the chilly darkness of Obłazowa Cave, hidden away in southern Poland's limestone cliffs, a remarkable relic slumbered beneath the grime for tens of thousands of millennia. Crafted from the twisted tusk of a woolly mammoth and only slightly more than 70 centimeters in length, this sweeping curve of ivory could be the world's oldest surviving boomerang — and by far its most mysterious.

First found in 1985, the boomerang already looked out of place back then. Initially, radiocarbon dating indicated that it was just about 18,000 years old. But new results released this week in PLOS ONE reverse that figure completely.

What the Data Says: Baynesian Modeling and Radiocarbon Dating

With sophisticated Bayesian modeling and indirect dating of nearby human and animal remains, an international team headed by Sahra Talamo has now dated its probable origin to between 42,000 and 39,000 years ago.

That places the ivory boomerang not only before agriculture was invented, but well ahead of the final Ice Age’s peak. And importantly, it places the artifact in a world still co-occupied with Neanderthals — a time when anatomically modern humans were only beginning to make symbolic and technological inroads around the European continent.

"It's the world's oldest boomerang and the world's only one of this shape and length to be discovered in Poland," Talamo told the BBC in an interview.

The Boomerang made of mammoth tusk of Ob?azowa Cave from layer VIII.

From Throwing Stick to Symbolic Craft

The object's refined curve and flattened cross-section are not ornamented accident. When hurled, this would have sailed, though not returned — a traditional "non-returning" boomerang shape better adapted to hitting far-away game than circling back to its thrower.

But its glossy polish, delicate incisions, and trace red pigmentation complicate this story. It wasn't just used for killing. It was handled, marked, and maybe even venerated.

Close inspection indicated evidence of repetitive use and deliberate shaping, such as smoothing striations and chevron-like converging lines along the midline. Red ochre residue — a pigment commonly associated with ritual or symbolic activity in the Paleolithic — was found to be present.

"Even a minute amount of contemporary carbon—from glue or conservation materials—can skew the radiocarbon date by tens of thousands of years," Talamo explained to New Scientist. "When you discover something remarkable, you shouldn't seal it in glue or other restoration products until you have finished all your analyses."

The scientists tactfully avoided directly testing the ivory itself and instead radiocarbon dated 13 adjacent animal bones and a human thumb phalanx from the same sedimentary unit. That human bone, which was Homo sapiens (not Neanderthal), dated to 31,500 years ago. The animal bones, statistically modeled, pinned the boomerang's actual provenance back to early Aurignacian times.

A New World of Symbolic Flight

The Aurignacian is often seen as the "great leap forward" in symbolic behavior: the age of carved figurines, flutes, pendants, and personal ornamentation. But Obłazowa’s boomerang opens another axis — a synthesis of form, function, and expression in motion. And unlike most known Paleolithic art, this piece may have left the hand in a blur of air, turning flight itself into a cultural act.

The stratigraphy of the site heightens the interest. Obłazowa was not a single camp but a palimpsest of human presence in layers over changing climates. From Mousterian Neanderthal deposits to Aurignacian Homo sapiens skeletons, it betrays a repeated human affinity with this cavern mouth above the Białka River — a symbolic terrain pre-dating agriculture.

Its uniqueness is important too. Aboriginal Australians deserve to be famous for their boomerangs — with 10,000-year-old wooden ones surviving — but the rest of the world has little evidence of them. Europe possesses throwing sticks, of course, but seldom curved ones.

A. Geographical location of Ob?azowa Cave in the Podhale basin, western Carpathians; B. View of the western entrance and main entrance of Ob?azowa Cave; C. Sedimentary section of Ob?azowa Cave and distribution of the archaeological horizons, A – Aurignaci

There are only a few cautious analogies: Stillfried in Austria, Jutland in Denmark, Velsen in the Netherlands. None of them, though, possess the technical or symbolic refinement of Obłazowa.

Flight of Meaning: Why Did the Boomerang Fly?

Then was the boomerang ritual, weapon, or both? The authors reserve their judgement, citing the ambiguity of symbolism in the archaeological record. Yet deliberate shaping of the object, studied placement, and association with ornaments — such as fox-tooth pendants and a sculpted shell — imply something beyond functionalism. Perhaps it was buried with intent, as part of a shamanic ceremony, or as a curated representation of group identity.

"These are totally clear indicators of behaviors we're unfamiliar with… that are so different from everything we saw in the deeper, Neanderthal-left cultural layers in Obłazowa," said co-author Paweł Valde-Nowak to Live Science.

More widely, it highlights what Talamo's team describes as "the subtle interplay of technology, symbolism, and environmental interaction" — a reminder that early European Homo sapiens were not merely learning to cope with cold-steppe existence but affirming themselves through flight, ivory, and movement. And in that sweep of mammoth tusk, we catch a glimpse of something unusual: not merely survival, but imagination.