Giant ground sloths the size of a car, elephantine herbivores and a deerlike animal with an elongated snout are depicted in rock paintings in the Colombian Amazon rainforest, according to a new study.
Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. More than 12,000 years ago, South America was teeming with an astonishing array of ice age beasts -- giant ground sloths the size of a car, elephantine herbivores and a deerlike animal with an elongated snout.
These extinct giants are among many animals immortalized in an 8-mile-long frieze of rock paintings at Serranía de la Lindosa in the Colombian Amazon rainforest -- art created by some of the earliest humans to live in the region, according to a new study. " have the whole diversity of Amazonia. Turtles and fishes to jaguars, monkeys and porcupines," said study author Jose Iriarte, a professor in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom.