– What may be the world’s oldest figurative cave art (the warty pig painting at Leang Tedongnge, at least 45,500 years old, possibly older).
– A hunting scene that may be the world’s oldest narrative composition in art (at Leang Karampuang, potentially over 51,000 years old).
– Evidence of very early human presence on the island — including stone tools dated to more than a million years ago, suggesting pre-sapiens hominins made ocean crossings to reach the island.
– And now the world’s oldest direct evidence of habitual human drug use (the betel nut evidence at Leang Bulu Bettue, 16,000 to 25,000 years old).

The frequency of record-breaking findings from Sulawesi is not coincidence.

It reflects several factors:

The limestone karst of South Sulawesi provides exceptional preservation conditions — the same alkaline, stable environment that preserves cave paintings for tens of thousands of years also preserves the chemical content of ancient bones and teeth.

The island’s geographic isolation — it was never connected to the Asian mainland — means that evolutionary and cultural developments there were somewhat independent of the mainland, potentially producing distinctive combinations of behavior and preservation.

Systematic archaeological work at the Sulawesi karst sites has been building for decades, with increasing sophistication in the methods applied.