Lascaux

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Discovered in 1940, Lascaux is a series of caves in southwestern France, near Montignac, that is famous for the numerous Paleolithic cave paintings contained on its walls. Research places most of the paintings at the beginning of the Magdalenian Age, around 15,000 B.C.E., although the subject matter and style of certain figures suggests that they may be somewhat more recent.[1]

History

The Lascaux caves were discovered on September 12, 1940 by seventeen year old Marcel Ravidat, accompanied by three of his friends: Jacques Marsal, Georges Agnel, and Simon Coencas. Word travelled quickly, and it wasn't long before leading archaeologists were contacted. Abbé Henri Breuil was one of the first archaeologists to study the site, where he found bone fragments, oil lamps, and other artifacts, as well as the hundreds of paintings and engraved images.

There was a great deal of public interest in Lascaux, and the caves had a great number of visitors. After World War II, the site entrance was enlarged and the floors lowered to accomodate the nearly 1,200 tourists per day who came to see the paintings. By 1955, the paintings had begun to show signs of deterioration due to the amount of carbon dioxide and moisture exhaled by visitors, and the site was closed to the public in 1963. The paintings were restored, and are now monitored on a daily basis.

Soon after the caves were closed to the public, construction was begun on a painstakingly exact replica of a portion of the caves, located only 200 meters from the original caves . Called "Lascaux II", the replica opened in 1983. Copied down to the texture of the rock, this nearly identical replica allows a large number of people to experience the cave paintings without posing a threat to their longetivity. Exact replicas of individual paintings are also displayed in the nearby Center of Prehistoric Art at Thot.


Inside the Caves of Lascaux

The Great Hall of the Bulls

Upon entering the caves, there is an initial steep slope, after which one comes into the Hall of the Bulls. The walls of this larger rotunda are covered with paintings of stags, bulls, and horses. Except for a small group of ochre stags, three red bovines and four red horses, the figures are all painted in black. The first image in the Hall of the Bulls is that of "the Unicorn", named because of the way the two horns and profile view appear almost to be one large horn. In front of the Unicorn is a herd of horses and an incompletely drawn bull. Three large aurochs, an extinct type of wild ox, can be found on the opposite side of the chamber. Most drawings in the Hall of the Bulls consist of pictoral representations of animals; there is no representation of foliage or landscape, and the only symbols present are groupings of black dots and variously colored dashes.

The Painted Gallery

Considered by some to be the pinnacle of Paleolithic cave art, the Painted Gallery is a continuation of the Great Hall of the Bulls.[2] The walls of the Painted Gallery depict numerous horses, aurochs, ibexes, as well as a stag at the entrance to the gallery and a bison at the back.

The Lateral Passage

Branching off to the right of the Great Hall of the Bulls is the Lateral Passage, which connects the Great Hall of the Bulls to the rest of the chambers. The ceiling in this passage is fairly low, despite excavation of the floor after World War II. The walls in this area have deteriorated due to corrosion predating the site's discovery, leaving few paintings or engravings readily visible. It is thought that, paintings and engravings once covered the entire surface of this gallery as well as the others.[3]

The Chamber of Engravings

Off the right of the Lateral Passage is the Chamber of Engravings, a smaller rotunda filled with over 600 engravings and paintings. The engravings predominate, and are seperated into three sections. On the lower third of the walls are aurochs, above them are deer, and, covering the entire dome, are horses. There is more overlapping of figures here than in any other chamber, making it difficult to accurately make out the various figures.

The Shaft of the Dead Man

Several meters lower than the back of the Chamber of Engravings is the Shaft of the Dead Man. Here is found the only figure of a human on the walls of Lascaux. This painting, entitled the "Scene of the Dead Man" is a triptych of a bison, a man, and what appears to be a rhinocerous. The man appears to have had a confrontation with the bison, lying apparently prone on the ground with a broken spear next to him. To the left of the spear lies what seems to be a stick with a bird on the top. Also present is the hook sign, which may represent a spear thrower.

The Main Gallery

Off to the left of the Chamber of Engravings is the Main Gallery, a series of chambers that descend in size. Within these chambers are several panels, mostly found on the left wall, and each having distinct characteristics. "The Panel of the Imprint", for example, contains horses, bison, and square symbols, while the "Black Cow Panel" has a single black cow with seven ibexes. Some of the square symbols are polychromatic, using shades of yellow, red, and violets dividing the larger square into smaller squares. In the rear of the Main Gallery, the Panel of the Back-to-Back Bison is the most typical example of three dimensional perspective. One bison overlaps the other, and reserves (small areas left blank) surround the rear bison as well as the back limbs of each animal. The three dimensional effect is heightened by the fact that the painting is situated in an area where the rock wall curves out on either side. On the right wall there is only one group of stags, named the "Swimming Stags". Only the heads and shoulders of the stags are visible.

The Chamber of Felines

Past the Main Gallery, deep in the cave, is the Chamber of Felines. Here, as in the other chambers, are horses and bison, but unlike other areas, there are felines as well as an absence of aurochs. This chamber is similar to the Chamber of Engravings in that it contains more engravings than paintings. The figures in this chamber have been poorly preserved, and are sometimes difficult to make out. At the end of the chamber is a group of three sets of two red dots, which may suggest a means of marking the end of the sanctuary.

Technique and Purpose

The cave painters at Lascaux, like those of other sites, used naturally occurring pigments to create their paintings. They may have used brushes, though none were found at the site, but it is equally as likely that they used mats of moss or hair, or merely chunks of raw color. Some parts of the paintings were painted with an airbrushing technique; hollow bones stained with color have also been found in the caves. Since the caves have no natural light, torches and stone lamps filled with animal fat were used to illuminate the caves. It is thought, due to the inaccessibilty of many of the chambers and the size and grandeur of the paintings, that the caves served as sacred spaces or ceremonial meeting places.[4]


Notes

  1. The Cave of Lascaux. French Ministry of Culture and Communication. Retrieved November 20, 2006.
  2. Lascaux Caves. Sacred Destinations. Retrieved November 20, 2006.
  3. The Cave of Lascaux. French Ministry of Culture and Communication. Retrieved November 20, 2006.
  4. Lascaux (ca. 15,000 B.C.E.). The Metropolitan Museum of Art (October 2000). Retrieved November 20, 2006.

External links

  • Lascaux Cave Official Lascaux Web site, from the French Ministry of Culture.
  • Lascaux Cave some info on the cave and more links
  • The Dawn of Rock Art. An article summarizing the earliest known rock art, with a focus on recently discovered painted caves in Europe, Grotto Cosquer and Grotto Chauvet.


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