LASCAUXMy tour in the Lascaux Caves

By: Payton Enge

The Hall of the BullsThe images in the Hall of the Bulls are amongst the most striking in all of Paleolithic art: 130 figures, including 36 representations of animals and some 50 geometric signs. This extensive frieze is composed of three animal themes – horses (17 individuals), cattle (11 cows and bulls) and deer (6 stags) – which recur consistently in the various parts of the cave. Exceptionally, a bear is also depicted.

The Axial Gallery

The totality includes 161 graphic entities, of which 58 are figurative (mostly animals), and 46 are various geometric signs – quadrangular, branching, rectilinear, nested elements, cruciform and groups of dots. There are also 57 indeterminate figures that may be signs, but that also may be sketches for animal figures.

The PassagewayThe Passageway links the Hall of the Bulls to the Nave and the Apse. It contains a great concentration of images that are often difficult to decipher. A total of 385 engraved and painted figures have been counted and identified, including horses, bison, ibexes, bovines, stags and various signs in the shapes of hooks, crosses and squares.

The Nave

There are four panels on the left wall of the Nave – those of the Seven Ibexes, the Imprint, the Great Black Cow and the Crossed Bison. The right wall contains only the Frieze of the Swimming Stags. The slope of the floor is the cause of this uneven distribution. The species depicted include horses, ibexes, stags, bison and aurochs, but in quite different proportions. As in every other part of the cave, horses are the dominant theme, with twenty-seven separate depictions in the Nave. The aurochs, on the other hand, appears only once, but dominates through its sheer size and its position at the centre of this vast tableau. There are also nine ibexes, six five bison, and six stags.

The Chamber of the Felines

The Chamber of the Felines extends for roughly 25 meters, along which André Glory counted more than 80 figures. Of the 51 animal figures in this gallery, the horse is the dominant species, with twenty-nine representations, followed by nine bison, four ibexes and three stags. There are no aurochs. Images of felines are more present here, with six depictions, than in the rest of the cave.

The Apse

On a wall space of some thirty square meters, and an average ceiling height of 3.5 meters, the Apse contains over a thousand figures. They include nearly 500 animals and 600 geometric signs or lines. They appear on the walls and ceiling, and with no interruption. Their density increases at the entrance at the far end, and reaches its peak in the Apsidiole, which is located at the base of the Shaft in the farthest part of this gallery. The very soft limestone surface provides a partial explanation for such a graphic outpouring.

The ShaftIn contrast to the preceding sectors – the Apse, the Passageway and the Hall of the Bulls – the Shaft contains only a limited number of figures: eight in all. Four are figures of animals (a horse, a bison, a bird and a rhinoceros) and three others are geometric shapes (dots and hooks). In the centre of the composition, the eye is drawn to a human figure.

Sources

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