The Lascaux Caves
were discovered purely by chance. On 12
September 1940 four boys were roaming through the woods above Montignac in
the Vezere Valley, when suddenly their little dog disappeared in front of
them. Terrified, they ran to the spot where he had been and discovered a
small crevice in the ground — thus began the adventure related above.
Caves were the first type of permanent
housing for human beings, when they were still active as hunters and
gatherers at the dawn of history. Around 15,000 ВС, several groups seem to
have settled near each other in the south-western region of Dordogne in
France. In nearly zoo caves, prehistoric remains have been discovered. Due
to the unusual atmospheric conditions present in these caves, an
astonishing number of palaeolithic paintings have been preserved in
excellent condition.
The discovery made by the four boys
affected the history of art as nothing had ever done before. In the
Lascaux Caves, which are about 100 metres long, more than 1,500
palaeolithic incised drawings and roughly 600 realistic paintings — of
bison, stag, ox and other animals — were discovered. Nowhere else have so
many prehistoric pictures been found preserved in one place. Researchers
assume that for about 5,000 years people have inhabited these caves,
painting the walls over and over again — ultimately leaving; behind a
"prehistoric art museum".
Some of these pictures are extremely
large: the walls of the biggest cavern (The Great Hall) is
decorated with some bulls measuring five metres in length. Unique in their
vitality and remarkable in the skill with which they were executed, these
pictures dramatically changed our view of art history. Until well into the
nineteenth century, it was thought that art had developed gradually and in
stages over time, similar to the way a child's art develops — from awkward
beginnings to more polished forms. In fact, when the first cave paintings
were discovered in 1879 at Altamira in northern Spain, they were regarded
as fakes. Further discoveries, above all the paintings at Lascaux, removed
all doubts: as early as 15,000 BC painting was already a "fine art".
The Great Hall
c.15,330-15,050 BC
Lascaux Caves, France
