The Cave of the Trois-Frères is a
cave
A cave or cavern is a natural void in the ground, specifically a space large enough for a human to enter. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. The word ''cave'' can refer to smaller openings such as sea ...
in southwestern
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
famous for its
cave paintings. It is located in
Montesquieu-Avantès, in the
Ariège ''
département
In the administrative divisions of France, the department (french: département, ) is one of the three levels of government under the national level (" territorial collectivities"), between the administrative regions and the communes. Ninety ...
''.
The cave is named for three brothers (french: trois frères), Max, Jacques, and Louis Begouën, who, along with their father
Comte , discovered it in 1914. The drawings of the cave were made famous in the publications of the 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 an ...
. The cave art appears to date to approximately 13,000 BC.
Artwork
One of the paintings, known as "
The Sorcerer
''The Sorcerer'' is a two-act comic opera, with a libretto by W. S. Gilbert and music by Arthur Sullivan. It was the British duo's third operatic collaboration. The plot of ''The Sorcerer'' is based on a Christmas story, ''An Elixir of Lo ...
", is the "most famous and enigmatic human figure" with the features of several different animals, whose exact characteristics remain a matter of debate.
Engravings featuring what appear to be several birds and a
cave cricket
The orthopteran family Rhaphidophoridae of the suborder Ensifera has a worldwide distribution. Common names for these insects include cave wētā, cave crickets, camelback crickets, camel crickets, Hogan bugs, spider crickets (sometimes shorte ...
were found on a fragment of bison bone at the junction of Trois-Frères with the Grotte d'Enlène. The grasshopper was portrayed with such fidelity that the insect's species has been determined. It is thought to be the earliest known representation of an insect.
[Bégouën H., 1929: À propos de l'idée de fécondité dans l'iconographie préhistorique, ''Bulletin de la Société préhistorique française'', 26, 3, pp 197–199.]
A variety of engraved animals are found on the cave walls, including lions, owls, and bison. Of particular note is a horse overlaid with claviform (club-like) symbols, and an apparently speared
brown bear
The brown bear (''Ursus arctos'') is a large bear species found across Eurasia and North America. In North America, the populations of brown bears are called grizzly bears, while the subspecies that inhabits the Kodiak Islands of Alaska is ...
vomiting blood.
Aside from the "Sorcerer", other human-like figures can be seen at Trois-Frères, such as the man-bison, and a character known as the "small sorcerer" who appears to be playing a
nose-flute.
Also of interest is an etched representation of a 59cm long
phallus that follows the contours of the cave walls.
Tuc d'Audoubert
The Trois-Freres cave is part of a single cave-complex formed by the
Volp River. The complex is divided into three caves; the central Trois-Freres, Enlène to the east, and the Tuc d'Audoubert to the west.
The Tuc d'Audoubert was discovered by the three teenage brothers in 1912. The galleries are situated on three levels; the River Volp flows through the lowest, the middle contains decorated galleries known as the ''La Salle Nuptiale'' (The Bridal Room) and ''La Galerie des Gravures'' (The Gallery of Engravings), while the upper has further decoration in ''La Chatière'' and ''Salle des Talons'' (Hall of Claws) and finishes in the ''Salle des Bisons'' (Hall of Bisons). In 2013 the
Tracking in Caves project tested experience based reading of prehistoric footprints by specialised trackers of
Ju/'hoansi San with great success.
The ''Salle des Bisons'' contains two masterfully modeled
bison, which were sculpted in clay with a stone spatula-like tool and the artist's fingers. The pair are among the largest and finest surviving prehistoric sculptures.
References
External links
Cave Paintings and Sculptures
{{Authority control
Caves containing pictograms in France
Landforms of Ariège (department)
Caves of Occitania (administrative region)
Archaeological sites in France
Art of the Upper Paleolithic