The Cave of Altamira (; es, Cueva de Altamira ) is a
cave complex, located near the historic town of
Santillana del Mar
Santillana del Mar () is a historic town situated in Cantabria, Spain. Its many historic buildings attract thousands of holidaymakers every year.
There is an old saying that Santillana del Mar is ''The Town of Three Lies'', since it is neither a ...
in
Cantabria
Cantabria (, also , , Cantabrian: ) is an autonomous community in northern Spain with Santander as its capital city. It is called a ''comunidad histórica'', a historic community, in its current Statute of Autonomy. It is bordered on the east ...
,
Spain
, image_flag = Bandera de España.svg
, image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg
, national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond")
, national_anthem = (English: "Royal March")
, i ...
. It is renowned for prehistoric
cave art featuring charcoal drawings and polychrome paintings of contemporary local fauna and human hands. The earliest paintings were applied during the
Upper Paleolithic
The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...
, around 36,000 years ago.
[ The site was discovered in 1868 by Modesto Cubillas and subsequently studied by ]Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola
Don Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola y Pedrueca or Marcelino de Sautuola was a Spanish jurist and amateur archaeologist who owned the land where the Altamira cave was found.
Altamira cave
The Altamira cave, now famous for its unique collection of pre ...
.
Aside from the striking quality of its polychromatic art, Altamira's fame stems from the fact that its paintings were the first European cave paintings for which a prehistoric origin was suggested and promoted. Sautuola published his research with the support of Juan de Vilanova y Piera in 1880, to initial public acclaim.
However, the publication of Sanz de Sautuola's research quickly led to a bitter public controversy among experts, some of whom rejected the prehistoric origin of the paintings on the grounds that prehistoric human beings lacked sufficient ability for abstract thought. The controversy continued until 1902, by which time reports of similar findings of prehistoric paintings in the Franco-Cantabrian region had accumulated and the evidence could no longer be rejected.
Altamira is located in the Franco-Cantabrian region
The Franco-Cantabrian region (also ''Franco-Cantabric region'') is a term applied in archaeology and history to refer to an area that stretches from Asturias, in northern Spain, to Aquitaine and Provence in Southern France. It includes the southe ...
and in 1985 was declared a World Heritage Site
A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for h ...
by UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...
as a key location of the Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain. The cave can no longer be visited, for conservation reasons, but there are replicas of a section at the site and elsewhere.
Description
The cave is approximately long and consists of a series of twisting passages and chambers. The main passage varies from two to six meters in height. The cave was formed through collapses following early karst phenomena in the calcareous rock of Mount Vispieres.
Archaeological excavations in the cave floor found rich deposits of artifacts from the Upper Solutrean
The Solutrean industry is a relatively advanced flint tool-making style of the Upper Paleolithic of the Final Gravettian, from around 22,000 to 17,000 BP. Solutrean sites have been found in modern-day France, Spain and Portugal.
Details
...
(c.18,500 years ago) and Lower Magdalenian (between c.16,590 and 14,000 years ago). Both periods belong to the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. In the two millennia between these two occupations, the cave was evidently inhabited only by wild animals.
Human occupants of the site were well-positioned to take advantage of the rich wildlife that grazed in the valleys of the surrounding mountains as well as the marine life available in nearby coastal areas. Around 13,000 years ago a rockfall sealed the cave's entrance, preserving its contents until its eventual discovery, which occurred after a nearby tree fell and disturbed the fallen rocks.
Human occupation was limited to the cave mouth, although paintings were created throughout the length of the cave. The artists used charcoal and ochre or hematite to create the images, often diluting these pigments to produce variations in intensity and creating an impression of chiaroscuro
Chiaroscuro ( , ; ), in art, is the use of strong contrasts between light and dark, usually bold contrasts affecting a whole composition. It is also a technical term used by artists and art historians for the use of contrasts of light to achi ...
. They also exploited the natural contours of the cave walls to give their subjects a three-dimensional effect. The Polychrome Ceiling is the most impressive feature of the cave, depicting a herd of extinct steppe bison (''Bison priscus'') in different poses, two horses, a large doe, and possibly a wild boar
The wild boar (''Sus scrofa''), also known as the wild swine, common wild pig, Eurasian wild pig, or simply wild pig, is a suid native to much of Eurasia and North Africa, and has been introduced to the Americas and Oceania. The species is ...
.
Dated to the Magdalenian occupation, these paintings include abstract shapes in addition to animal subjects. Solutrean paintings include images of horses and goats, as well as handprints that were created when artists placed their hands on the cave wall and blew pigment over them to leave a negative image. Numerous other caves in northern Spain contain Paleolithic art, but none is as complex or well-populated as Altamira.
Discovery, excavation, scepticism
In 1879, amateur archaeologist Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola
Don Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola y Pedrueca or Marcelino de Sautuola was a Spanish jurist and amateur archaeologist who owned the land where the Altamira cave was found.
Altamira cave
The Altamira cave, now famous for its unique collection of pre ...
was led by his eight-year-old daughter María to discover the cave's drawings.[Travel Advisory; A Modern Copy Of Ancient Masters](_blank)
''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'', 4 November 2001 The cave was excavated by Sautuola and archaeologist Juan Vilanova y Piera from the University of Madrid, resulting in a much acclaimed publication in 1880 which interpreted the paintings as Paleolithic in origin. The French specialists, led by Gabriel de Mortillet
Louis Laurent Gabriel de Mortillet (29 August 1821 – 25 September 1898), French archaeologist and anthropologist, was born at Meylan, Isère.
Biography
Mortillet was educated at the Jesuit college of Chambéry and at the Paris Conservat ...
and Émile Cartailhac
Émile Cartailhac (15 February 1845 – 26 November 1921) was a French prehistorian, one of the founding fathers of the studies of the cave art. He is perhaps best remembered because of his involvement with the Altamira paintings.
Cartailhac was ...
, were particularly adamant in rejecting the hypothesis of Sautuola and Piera, whose findings were loudly ridiculed at the 1880 Prehistorical Congress in Lisbon.
Due to the high artistic quality, and the exceptional state of conservation of the paintings, Sautuola was accused of forgery, as he was unable to answer why there were no soot (smoke) marks on the walls and ceilings of the cave. A fellow countryman maintained that the paintings had been produced by a contemporary artist, on Sautuola's orders. Later, Sautuola found out the artist could have used marrow fat as oil for the lamp, producing much less soot than any other combustibles.
It was not until 1902, when several other findings of prehistoric paintings had served to render the hypothesis of the extreme antiquity of the Altamira paintings less offensive, that the scientific society retracted their opposition to the Spaniards. That year, Cartailhac emphatically admitted his mistake in the famous article, "Mea culpa d'un sceptique", published in the journal ''L'Anthropologie''. Sautuola, having died 14 years earlier, did not live to witness his rehabilitation.
Cartailhac went on to write a pair of books about the cave, assisted by Henri Breuil's hand-drawn reproductions of the paintings. Breuil was a both a Catholic priest and competent draughtsman, whose connection with the cave is discussed in the first chapter of G. K. Chesterton's book, The Everlasting Man
''The Everlasting Man'' is a Christian apologetics book written by G. K. Chesterton, published in 1925. It is, to some extent, a deliberate rebuttal of H. G. Wells' ''The Outline of History'', disputing Wells' portrayals of human life and civi ...
.
Further excavation work on the cave was done by Hermilio Alcalde del Río between 1902–04, the German Hugo Obermaier
Hugo Obermaier (29 January 1877, in Regensburg – 12 November 1946, in Fribourg) was a distinguished Spanish-German prehistorian and anthropologist who taught at various European centres of learning. Although he was born in Germany, he was late ...
between 1924–25 and finally by Joaquín González Echegaray in 1968.
Dating and periodization
There is no scientific agreement on the dating of the archeological artifacts found in the cave, nor the drawings and paintings, and scientists continue to evaluate the age of the cave art at Altamira.
In 2008, researchers using uranium-thorium dating found that the paintings were completed over a period of up to 20,000 years rather than during a comparatively brief period.
A later study published in 2012 based on data obtained from further uranium-thorium dating research, dated some paintings in several caves in North Spain, including some of the claviform signs in the "Gran sala" of Altamira. The oldest sign found, a "large red claviform-like symbol of ''Techo de los Polícromos''", was dated to (corrected), i.e. still well within the Aurignacian. A red dotted outline horse, also in the ''Techo de los Polícromos'' chamber, was dated to (beginning Solutrean
The Solutrean industry is a relatively advanced flint tool-making style of the Upper Paleolithic of the Final Gravettian, from around 22,000 to 17,000 BP. Solutrean sites have been found in modern-day France, Spain and Portugal.
Details
...
), establishing that the paintings span a period of more than 10,000 years.[A. W. G. Pike et al., "U-Series Dating of Paleolithic Art in 11 Caves in Spain", ''Science'' 336, 1409 (2012), . "We present uranium-series disequilibrium dates of calcite deposits overlying or underlying art found in 11 caves, including the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage sites of Altamira, El Castillo, and Tito Bustillo, Spain. The results demonstrate that the tradition of decorating caves extends back at least to the Early Aurignacian period, with minimum ages of 40.8 thousand years for a red disk,
37.3 thousand years for a hand stencil, and 35.6 thousand years for a claviform-like symbol.
These minimum ages reveal either that cave art was a part of the cultural repertoire of the first
anatomically modern humans in Europe or that perhaps Neandertals also engaged in painting caves."
Table 1: Ages are corrected for detritus by using an assumed 232Th/238U activity of and 230Th/238U and 234U/238U at equilibrium.
]
Visitors and replicas
During the 1970s and 2000s, the paintings were being damaged by the carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide ( chemical formula ) is a chemical compound made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in the gas state at room temperature. In the air, carbon dioxide is trans ...
and water vapor
(99.9839 °C)
, -
, Boiling point
,
, -
, specific gas constant
, 461.5 J/( kg·K)
, -
, Heat of vaporization
, 2.27 MJ/kg
, -
, Heat capacity
, 1.864 kJ/(kg·K)
Water vapor, water vapour or aqueous vapor is the gaseous p ...
in the breath of the large number of visitors. Altamira was completely closed to the public in 1977, and reopened to limited access in 1982. Very few visitors were allowed in per day, resulting in a three-year waiting list. After green mold began to appear on some paintings in 2002, the caves were closed to public access.
A replica cave and museum were built nearby and completed in 2001 by Manuel Franquelo and Sven Nebel, reproducing the cave and its art. The replica allows a more comfortable view of the polychrome paintings of the main hall of the cave, as well as a selection of minor works. It also includes some sculptures of human faces that are not visitable in the real cave.
As well as the adjacent National Museum and Research Center of Altamira there are reproductions in the National Archaeological Museum of Spain
The National Archaeological Museum ( es, Museo Arqueológico Nacional; MAN) is a museum in Madrid, Spain. It is located on Calle de Serrano beside the Plaza de Colón, sharing its building with the National Library of Spain.
History
The museu ...
(Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the Largest cities of the Europ ...
), in the Deutsches Museum
The Deutsches Museum (''German Museum'', officially (English: ''German Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology'')) in Munich, Germany, is the world's largest museum of science and technology, with about 28,000 exhibited objects from ...
in Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...
(completed 1964) and in Japan (completed 1993).
During 2010 there were plans to reopen access to the cave towards the end of that year. In December 2010, however, the Spanish Ministry of Culture decided that the cave would remain closed to the public. This decision was based on advice from a group of experts who had found that the conservation conditions inside the cave had become much more stable since the closure.
Cultural impact
Some of the polychrome paintings at Altamira Cave are well known in Spanish popular culture. The logo used by the autonomous government of Cantabria to promote tourism to the region is based on one of the bisons in this cave. ''Bisonte'' (Spanish for "bison"), a Spanish cigarette brand of the 20th century, also used a Paleolithic style bison figure along with its logo.
The Spanish comic series '' Altamiro de la Cueva'', created in 1965, are a consequence of the fame of Altamira Cave. The comic series depicts the adventures of a group of prehistoric cavemen, shown as modern people, but dressed in pieces of fur, a bit like the Flintstones
''The Flintstones'' is an American animated sitcom produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions. The series takes place in a romanticized Stone Age setting and follows the activities of the titular family, the Flintstones, and their next-door neighb ...
.
The song "The Caves of Altamira" appears on the 1976 album ''The Royal Scam
''The Royal Scam'' is the fifth studio album by American rock band Steely Dan. It was produced by Gary Katz and was originally released by ABC Records in 1976. ''The Royal Scam'' features more prominent guitar work than the prior Steely Dan album ...
'' by jazz-rock band Steely Dan, later covered by soul group Perri.
The mid-20th-century modern dinnerware line Primitive, designed by Viktor Schreckengost for the American pottery company Salem China, was based on the bison, deer, and stick figure hunters depicted in the Altamira cave paintings.
The song "Cuevas de Altamira" (Caves of Altamira) appears on the 1978 album ''Cuevas de Altamira'' by the symphonic progressive rock-folk group Ibio from Cantabria.
The iconic bison image has been used for the cover of the poetry collection ''Songs for the Devil and Death
Hal Duncan (born 21 October 1971, real name Alasdair) is a Scottish science fiction and fantasy writer.
His works have been listed in the New Weird genre, but he prefers not to ascribe his writings to any genre.
Life
Hal Duncan was born in Ki ...
'' by Scottish author Hal Duncan
Hal Duncan (born 21 October 1971, real name Alasdair) is a Scottish science fiction and fantasy writer.
His works have been listed in the New Weird genre, but he prefers not to ascribe his writings to any genre.
Life
Hal Duncan was born in Ki ...
.
The protagonist in Satyajit Ray's film ''Agantuk
''Agantuk'' () is a 1991 Bengali-language drama film written and directed by Satyajit Ray. Notable for being Ray's last film, it was based on one of his own short stories, ''Atithi''. A joint Indo-French production, it received financial backin ...
'' was inspired by the charging Bison painting to leave his home and study tribal people.
In 2007, the caves were selected as one of the '' 12 Treasures of Spain'', a contest conducted by broadcasters Antena 3 and COPE
The cope (known in Latin as ''pluviale'' 'rain coat' or ''cappa'' 'cape') is a liturgical vestment, more precisely a long mantle or cloak, open in front and fastened at the breast with a band or clasp. It may be of any liturgical colour.
A c ...
.
In 2016, British Director Hugh Hudson
Hugh Hudson (born 25 August 1936) is an English film director. He was among a generation of British directors who would begin their career making documentaries and television commercials before going on to have success in films. He directed the ...
released the film ''Altamira
Altamira may refer to:
People
*Altamira (surname)
Places
* Cave of Altamira, a cave in Cantabria, Spain famous for its paintings and carving
*Altamira, Pará, a city in the Brazilian state of Pará
* Altamira, Huila, a town and municipality in ...
'' (called ''Finding Altamira'' outside Spain) about the discovery of the caves, starring Antonio Banderas and with music by Mark Knopfler
Mark Freuder Knopfler (born 12 August 1949) is a British singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. Born in Scotland and raised in England, he was the lead guitarist, singer and songwriter of the rock band Dire Straits. He pursued a s ...
released on the soundtrack album ''Altamira
Altamira may refer to:
People
*Altamira (surname)
Places
* Cave of Altamira, a cave in Cantabria, Spain famous for its paintings and carving
*Altamira, Pará, a city in the Brazilian state of Pará
* Altamira, Huila, a town and municipality in ...
''.
See also
* 7742 Altamira, asteroid named after the cave
* Art of the Upper Paleolithic
The art of the Upper Paleolithic represents the oldest form of prehistoric art. Figurative art is present in Europe and Southeast Asia, beginning between about 40,000 to 35,000 years ago.
Non-figurative cave paintings, consisting of hand ...
* Chauvet Cave
The Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc Cave (french: Grotte Chauvet-Pont d'Arc, ) in the Ardèche department of southeastern France is a cave that contains some of the best-preserved figurative cave paintings in the world, as well as other evidence of Upper Pale ...
* Caves in Cantabria
* List of Stone Age art
This is a descriptive list of Stone Age art, the period of prehistory characterised by the widespread use of stone tools. This article contains, by sheer volume of the artwork discovered, a very incomplete list of the works of the painters, sculpt ...
* Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain
References
Bibliography
* Curtis, Gregory. ''The Cave Painters: Probing the Mysteries of the World's First Artists''. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006 (hardcover, )).
* Guthrie, R. Dale. ''The Nature of Prehistoric Art''. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006 (hardcover, ).
* McNeill, William H
"Secrets of the Cave Paintings"
''The New York Review of Books''
Vol. 53, No. 16, October 19, 2006.
*
Sustainable tourism and social value at World Heritage Sites: Towards a conservation plan for Altamira, Spain. Annals of Tourism Research. Eva Parga-Dans & Pablo Alonso González.
The Altamira controversy: Assessing the economic impact of a world heritage site for planning and tourism management. Journal of Cultural Heritage. Eva Parga-Dans & Pablo Alonso González.
The social value of heritage: Balancing the promotion-preservation relationship in the Altamira World Heritage Site, Spain. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management. Eva Parga-Dans, Pablo Alonso González & Raimundo Otero-Enríquez.
External links
Altamira Cave National Museum
The Spanish Cave of Altamira opens – with politics
Bradshaw Foundation Article
* "Les peintures préhistoriques de la grotte d’Altamira", Cartailhac and Breuil founding article (1903), online and analyzed o
BibNum
small> lick 'à télécharger' for English version/small>
Human Timeline (Interactive)
– Smithsonian, National Museum of Natural History
The National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. In 2021, with 7 ...
(August 2016)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Altamira, Cave Of
1868 archaeological discoveries
Limestone caves
Caves of Cantabria
Cantabrian symbols
Prehistoric sites in Spain
Archaeological sites in Spain
World Heritage Sites in Spain
Caves containing pictograms in Spain
Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain