Amid the Second World War, four young boys unearthed a Paleolithic masterpiece when they stumbled upon a cave in southwest France. The boys were entranced by the vivid hues of red, yellow, and black that formed vast scenes of animals appearing to move across the cave walls. Experts have studied the paintings and engravings that adorn Lascaux Cave, seeking to understand the artist’s intentions and to dig deeper into the lives of our ancestors.
How Was Lascaux Cave and Its Unique Paintings Discovered?
In the autumn of 1940, young Marcel Ravidat and his dog, Robot, stumbled across the opening of a cave near the town of Montignac in the Dordogne region of southwest France. Marcel returned to the scene with three friends and entered the cave to uncover a monumental display of prehistoric art. The young explorers guarded the entrance to protect their discovery, charging their peers a small fee to enter before an expert authenticated the cave.
Lascaux Cave became renowned for the sheer size and quality of the paintings, which are estimated to have been created by early modern humans during the Paleolithic, around 20,000 years ago. The cave, with three narrow axes, is divided into seven sections: the Hall of the Bulls, the Axial Gallery, the Nave, the Passageway, the Chamber of the Felines, the Shaft, and the Apse. Represented in the cave are 2,000 paintings and engravings, including an array of different animals, abstract signs, and one human-like figure.
In response to threats to the conservation of the cave, Lascaux was closed to the public in 1963. Shortly after, in 1979, Lascaux Cave was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site alongside other painted caves in the Vézère Valley. Visitor’s breath, artificial lighting, and algal growth caused damage to the cave walls, which later became colonized by fungal outbreaks. To allow visitors to continue to engage with the emotional experience of the cave art, a series of replicas of the original paintings were created, including a real-scale replica called Lascaux IV, located in the International Center of Parietal Art.
The Great Hall of the Bulls
Directly by the entrance to the cave is the most well-known section of Lascaux: the Hall of the Bulls. The 20-meter-long section was named after the prominence of the painted bulls, or aurochs, an extinct ancestor of domestic cattle that were widespread in Europe until the 17th century. Showcasing the unique creative intelligence of modern humans, the ancient artists used the wall’s contours to create scenes of bulls that appear to be in motion. While cattle are dominant among the 36 animals in the chamber, a variety of animals are depicted, including stags, horses, and a bear.
Unusually, the first animal encountered upon entering the cave is not a traditional species but a mythical creature, titled the Unicorn. With a body constructed of different species and two lines protruding from its head, the animal appears to be driving the surrounding animals forward; including a frieze of eight black horses. Researchers have proposed that the Unicorn is a creature created through religious imagination, an attempt to paint a horned bull using perspective, or a feline with horns painted to disguise it.
In striking contrast to the calcite walls, two black bulls stand opposingly, with a frieze of small stags and a brown horse between them. On the left of the panel is a large bull with red details, its body shrouded by the Frieze of the Black Horses. A fully depicted bull is positioned opposite, with striking horns and geometric signs marking the head and upper body. On the right wall of the hall is a black bear, the only one of its species in the cave. The bear, hidden within the third bull of the section, can be identified by its protruding head and claws.
The Vivid Colors of the Axial Gallery
The following section, the Axial Gallery, is another prominent section of Lascaux Cave, renowned for its large, vivid panels. This section showcases many technically impressive examples of parietal art, including stationary paintings or engravings made on a cave wall. For instance, the anatomy and detail of the Falling Cow, the distinctive yellow and black coloring of the Chinese horses, the hand-brushed horns of the Black Stag, and the distorted projection of the Cow with Collar. Among the animals are various geometric symbols, such as a collection of long, red branches and crossing lines thought to resemble traps.
Interestingly, the largest painting, the Great Black Bull, is found not in the Hall of the Bulls, but in the 30-meter-long Axial Gallery. The bull spans a five-meter radius, with a prominent darkly colored hide and two cows painted along the body. Another unique piece in the section is the Confronted Ibexes, one black ibex and one yellow ibex facing one another, painted predominantly using dots rather than lines.
A red cow painted on the ceiling of the area demonstrates the skill of the painters, possessing the ability to access and work with the curvature of the surface. The sizable Upside-Down Horse painting, depicting a complete horse, similarly follows the contours of the walls close by. Many paintings in the gallery hint at different seasons, suggesting that the artists entered the cave to paint during various times of the year, as represented in their work. The dark and bright ibexes are believed to represent the change in fur color during winter and summer, while the antlers of the stags indicate spring or summer.
The Lone Human in the Shaft
Containing only eight figures in total, the Shaft is one of the most momentous sections in the cave, renowned for the presence of a human figure, a rarity in Paleolithic cave art. The ithyphallic humanoid is found on the Panel of the Wounded Man, facing a disemboweled bison at an angle. Below the man is a bird perched on the end of a stick, resembling the bird-like face of the human figure above. To the left is a rhinoceros painted in black, with two rows of three consecutive dots below the tail.
Scholars such as Henri Breuil and Joseph Campbell interpreted the famous Shaft scene to represent shamanism. Through this interpretation, the bird-headed human is a shaman in a trance state, and the bird perched on a stick is instead considered a staff. In contrast, others believe the painting to be a more literal representation of a hunting scene, displaying a man who has wounded a bison using a projectile.
Opposite the Panel of the Wounded Man is the Panel of the Black Horse, consisting of a simplistic outline of a black horse. The artist created the painting using the same black pigment as the other figures in the Shaft. Unlike the bison and the rhinoceros, which both depict a body, the horse is restricted to the head and neck.
Discovering the Artist’s Equipment
Alongside the remarkable volume of paintings and engravings found on the cave walls and ceilings, archaeologists have discovered the very tools that were used to create the art, including flint stone tools and palettes. To illuminate the cave while they worked, the artists of Lascaux used hearths and stone lamps filled with animal fat, over 100 of which were uncovered. Distinct from the typical limestone plaques in the cave, researchers discovered a red sandstone lamp in the Shaft that was uniquely carved and polished and had an engraved handle.
The artists at Lascaux used twelve pigments, ranging from pale yellow to black, that were largely made of powdered minerals. Minerals were often mixed to create the pigments rather than used alone. For example, black pigment was made with calcium phosphate, quartz, and manganese dioxide, and red was made predominantly with hematite, clay, and quartz. To reach the tall ceilings and walls of the cave, the painters perched on scaffolding made from tree limbs and found recesses in the walls, which they compressed with clay and branches to settle on.
The Mysteries of Lascaux Cave
The greatest mysteries of Lascaux lie beneath the surface, as researchers have pondered the absence of what they expect to see. Where are the landscapes that the artists looked upon each day, the trees, rivers, skies, and mountains? Why, despite their abundance at the time, can only a single depiction of a reindeer be found? Even more perplexing, amidst the immense animal murals is a simplistic stick-like human figure, with an unusual bird-like head.
Archaeologist and priest Henri Breuil, who spent considerable time examining the cave, believed the artist’s creations represented hunting magic. Breuil’s theory proposed that semi-human figures, such as the bird-like human in Lascaux, could represent hunters in disguise or spiritual beings during ceremonies. From this perspective, humans are not rare in Paleolithic art but hidden behind the faces of the animals that we see on the walls. Further scholars have proposed that parietal art symbolizes religion or spirituality and suggest that people used the art to contact or illustrate contact with the spiritual world.
Other approaches taken to understand the illustrations include the work of French philosopher Georges Bataille, who saw the animal-like human figures as representations of people’s connections to the animals. Another hypothesis suggests that depictions in Lascaux showcase astronomical understanding. Within the Hall of the Bulls, a collection of six spots resemble the star cluster we know today as the Pleiades, part of the Taurus constellation. Regardless of its purpose, Lascaux Cave remains a profound discovery and source of insight into the lives of our ancestors 20,000 years ago.
