BBCnews is carrying this article about a scientist who claims to have discovered a pair of 200,000 year old sculptures. If true, they would represent the earliest artwork of this sort ever found, and the possibly even the first from a truly non-human species of hominid (Homo Erectus).

However, there are lots of problems with this guy's hypothesis... he doesn't say exactly why he thinks they're so old. Also, it's quite possible these are natural formations, never touched by hands of any sort. Finally, 150,000 years ago is just inside the range of Homo Sapiens, although even then finding something like this in Italy, at a time when H. Sapiens was thought to be exclusively African, would still be a find.

Only careful examination of the artifacts will tell. However, it is interesting to think about.