The Caves of Gargas (french: Grottes de Gargas, ) in the Pyrenees region of France are known for their

cave art In archaeology, Cave paintings are a type of parietal art (which category also includes petroglyphs, or engravings), found on the wall or ceilings of caves. The term usually implies prehistoric origin, and the oldest known are more than 40,000 ye ...

from 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 ...

period - about 27,000 years old. The caves are open to the public.

Location

The caves are located near the town of

Aventignan Aventignan (; oc, Aventinhan) is a commune in the Hautes-Pyrénées department in southwestern France. Geography Close to Aventignan are the Gargas caves, a natural underground formation of stalactites and stalagmites. The caves are sometimes d ...

in the

Hautes-Pyrénées Hautes-Pyrénées (; Gascon/Occitan: ''Nauts Pirenèus / Hauts Pirenèus'' awts piɾeˈnɛʊs es, Altos Pirineos; ca, Alts Pirineus alts piɾiˈneʊs English: Upper Pyrenees) is a department in the region of Occitania, southwestern France. ...

department in south-western France, at the edge of the

Haute-Garonne Haute-Garonne (; oc, Nauta Garona, ; en, Upper Garonne) is a department in the Occitanie region of Southwestern France. Named after the river Garonne, which flows through the department. Its prefecture and main city is Toulouse, the country's ...

close to

Saint-Bertrand-de-Comminges Saint-Bertrand-de-Comminges (, literally ''Saint-Bertrand of Comminges''; Gascon language, Gascon: ''Sent Bertran de Comenge'') is a Communes of France, commune (municipality) and former episcopal see in the Haute-Garonne Departments of France, ...

History

Human occupation

The caves have yielded evidence of occupation (bones, lithics (

stone tools A stone tool is, in the most general sense, any tool made either partially or entirely out of stone. Although stone tool-dependent societies and cultures still exist today, most stone tools are associated with prehistoric (particularly Stone Ag ...

) and

portable art Portable art (sometimes called mobiliary art) refers to the small examples of Prehistoric art that could be carried from place to place, which is especially characteristic of the Art of the Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic eras. Often made of ivo ...

) from the

Mousterian The Mousterian (or Mode III) is an archaeological industry of stone tools, associated primarily with the Neanderthals in Europe, and to the earliest anatomically modern humans in North Africa and West Asia. The Mousterian largely defines the latt ...

to the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

, but it is most famous for its paintings and engravings of the

. The paintings have numerous negative hand stencils made by the

stencil Stencilling produces an image or pattern on a surface, by applying pigment to a surface through an intermediate object, with designed holes in the intermediate object, to create a pattern or image on a surface, by allowing the pigment to reach ...

technique. The hands are red (

ochre Ochre ( ; , ), or ocher in American English, is a natural clay earth pigment, a mixture of ferric oxide and varying amounts of clay and sand. It ranges in colour from yellow to deep orange or brown. It is also the name of the colours produced ...

) or black (

manganese oxide Manganese oxide is any of a variety of manganese oxides and hydroxides.Wells A.F. (1984) ''Structural inorganic chemistry'' 5th edition Oxford Science Publications, . These include * Manganese(II) oxide, MnO * Manganese(II,III) oxide, Mn3O4 * Mang ...

), using a mixture of iron oxide and manganese crushed with animal fat, and sprayed around the hand against the wall. Some have one or more fingers absent which leads to hypotheses of diseases, frostbite and ritual amputation, but most researchers prefer the symbolism of bending one or more fingers. Many figurative engravings are also present in other parts of the caves, depicting

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...

bison Bison are large bovines in the genus ''Bison'' (Greek: "wild ox" (bison)) within the tribe Bovini. Two extant and numerous extinct species are recognised. Of the two surviving species, the American bison, ''B. bison'', found only in North Ame ...

aurochs The aurochs (''Bos primigenius'') ( or ) is an extinct cattle species, considered to be the wild ancestor of modern domestic cattle. With a shoulder height of up to in bulls and in cows, it was one of the largest herbivores in the Holocen ...

ibex An ibex (plural ibex, ibexes or ibices) is any of several species of wild goat (genus ''Capra''), distinguished by the male's large recurved horns, which are transversely ridged in front. Ibex are found in Eurasia, North Africa and East Africa. ...

and

mammoth A mammoth is any species of the extinct elephantid genus ''Mammuthus'', one of the many genera that make up the order of trunked mammals called proboscideans. The various species of mammoth were commonly equipped with long, curved tusks and, ...

. Carbon-14 dating of a bone stuck in a crack in a wall decorated with hand stencils revealed close to 27,000 years BP, indicating that the cave was frequented in the

Gravettian The Gravettian was an archaeological industry of the European Upper Paleolithic that succeeded the Aurignacian circa 33,000 years BP. It is archaeologically the last European culture many consider unified, and had mostly disappeared by 2 ...

period. It is surmised that the Hands paintings probably date from this period. Manos de Gargas (Francia).png, Incisive de bovidé percée (2).jpg, Gargas cave, Lithic industry.jpg, Poinçon sur os abrasé MHNT Gargas.jpg,

Discovery

The two chambers of the caves began to be scientifically explored and documented at the end of the 19th century by

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 ...

and Abbé

Henri Breuil Henri Édouard Prosper Breuil (28 February 1877 – 14 August 1961), often referred to as Abbé Breuil, was a French Catholic priest, archaeologist, anthropologist, ethnologist and geologist. He is noted for his studies of cave art in the Somme a ...

, but it was Felix Regnault who discovered the hand-print images in 1906.

Tourism

The caves have been classified since 1910 by the French Ministry of Culture as a ''

monument historique ''Monument historique'' () is a designation given to some national heritage sites in France. It may also refer to the state procedure in France by which National Heritage protection is extended to a building, a specific part of a building, a coll ...

'' (historic monument), Schedule 2, and are open to the public.

References

Bibliography

* Foucher Pascal, San Juan-Foucher Cristina, Rumeau Yoan, ''La grotte de Gargas. Un siècle de découvertes'', Édition Communautés de Communes du Canton de Saint-Laurent-de-Neste, 2007, 128 pages. {{DEFAULTSORT:Gargas, caves of 19th-century archaeological discoveries Caves of Occitania (administrative region) Caves containing pictograms in France Stone Age sites in France Monuments historiques of Occitania (administrative region) World Heritage Sites in France Mousterian