The Taï plaque is a piece of bovine rib from the Grotte du Taï, a 12,000-year-old site in France. Though only 3 inches long, the bone fragment was inscribed with more than a thousand marks. As might be surmised from the minute size of the artifact, the marks it contains are so small they can be seen clearly only under magnification. The marks are also not grouped in any way detectable by unassisted visual inspection. Scholars like Alexander Marshack have speculated that the marks were accumulated over a period of several years, and that the artifact perhaps functioned as a lunar calendar. However, the miniscule size of the marks, when coupled with their large quantity, lack of overt grouping, and the fixed nature of inscriptions, make the marks difficult to see and then differentiate for the purpose of counting them. Their large quantity would also make it difficult to keep track of their number with human memory, especially over the several years involved in their accumulation. Nonetheless, because one or more individuals may have been dedicated to the task of accumulating the marks over a period of several years, the Taï plaque suggests the society that made the artifact was specialized and complex.