Are these photos of 40,000-yr-old idol of Lord Narasimha found in Germany?

Hyderabad: A set of three photos are being shared with the claim that a sculpture of Lord Narasimha has been found in Germany. It is also being claimed that through carbon dating it was found that the sculpture is 35,000 to 40,000 years old.

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Fact Check

NewsMeter performed a reverse image search on each of the pictures and found that the first photo is of Lord Narasimha and the second and third pictures are of the Lion Man excavated in a cave in Germany.

On performing a reverse image search of the first picture, we found that it was used in a feature story by The Sampradaya Sun. The photo caption says the idol is of "Lord Nrsimhadev" and the location is Sridham Mayapur. (See the photo here.)

We ran a keyword search and found that Sridham Mayapur is in West Bengal and also found a video uploaded by the verified YouTube channel Hare Krsna TV which shows the same idol. The video is titled "Abhishek of Lord Narasimha at ISKCON Mayapur."

On performing a reverse image search of the other two pictures, we found similar pictures on the German website Dons Maps. It said the figurine was excavated from the cave of Hohlenstein-Stadel in Germany. It also said that earlier, it used to be called Lion lady, but now it is known as Lion Man.

Further, we ran a keyword search and found an article by Nature titled "Lion man takes pride of place as oldest statue." The article carries the same picture and says the "30,000-year-old carving might be work of Neanderthals or modern humans."

It also says that the ivory carvings found in a cave in southwestern Germany could be examples of the oldest figurative art.

It is evident that the first photo is of Lord Narasimha from Sridham Mayapur in West Bengal and the other two photos are of the Löwenmensch, or Lion Man, excavated in Germany. Hence, the claim is false.