LONDON, ENGLAND.- The British Museum presents "Prehistory: Objects of Power". One of the defining characteristics of being human is the creation of objects, first seen some 2.5 million years ago at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. Artefacts gave instant advantage in the quest for food and security, but these functional objects progressively took on other meanings and values. They came to symbolise human control over animals and the environment and signify relationships with other people and the spiritual world. This new exhibition illustrates the varied ways in which prehistoric objects, both the mundane and the exceptional, could be involved in the exercise of power and control from the earliest times up until the end of the European Bronze Age (800 BC).

From as early as 1.5 million years ago, during the Lower Palaeolithic period, flint tools of exceptional size were created, such as the Edmonsham handaxe. Size in itself had begun to matter for personal prowess, irrespective of the object's utilitarian value. By the Upper Palaeolithic (35,000 years ago), ornaments were being suspended on body and costume and the first inescapably non-functional objects had appeared. From this remote time on, humans were both creators of artefacts and authors of their meanings. The Upper Palaeolithic also saw the development of sophisticated art represented by a number of exhibits including the extraordinary Montastruc ivory spearthrower in the guise of a mammoth. The artistic focus on animals highlights both human dependence on, and spiritual engagement with, the animal kingdom.