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Paintings from the upper gallery of the Altxerri, not only of the oldest but also significant

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The paintings in the upper gallery of the Uprising are the oldest in Europe dated by the C-14 method, according to an article published in the Journal of Human Evolution. Not only Chauvet: Dating Aurignacian rock art in Altxerri B Cave (northern Spain) is the title of the article, whose authors are researchers from the universities of Cantabria, Burgos and Tolosa (Occitania). Among them is the archaeologist Diego Garate, who considers that the importance of the paintings is not limited to his age.

The most studied and known paintings of the Altxerri belong to the lower gallery. Due to its importance, the cave of the Elevation, declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, belongs to the Magdalenian culture. However, those who have now studied are in another gallery (Altxerri B). A large bison of almost four meters, a bear, a feline, stripes and other figures appear on the same wall, and the first work of the researchers has been to date them.

Garate has recognized that “it was impossible to date directly”. They were painted red ochre and were not covered with calcite. Therefore, indirect data have been used to know the origin of the paintings. Among other things, they have made a chrono-stylistic comparison and have seen that the paintings of the French caves of Chauvet and Arcy-sur-Cure are similar. In addition, organic remains (bone remains and burnt bones) have been dated to the floor next to the wall of the paintings using the C-14. From all the data it follows that about 39,000 years ago.

In Cantabria, in the cave of El Castillo, there are other paintings even older. For example, a red painted disc showed a minimum age of 40,800 years using the uranium/thorium technique. In any case, Garate considers that it does not matter much to see which of them are the oldest: “The value of Altxerri’s paintings is not limited to age. On the one hand, the painting with the oldest dating of El Castillo is an album, and here we have figurative art. That is something else. Therefore, in this sense, they are not comparable. And on the other hand, we cannot say which ones are older, because the datations are not exact, but we can say that those of the Treasury are the Aurignacians”.

Among the paintings stands out the bison and the feline. “The bison is impressive, four meters, something that does not exist in the whole Cantabrian, and there is a feline that is not normal.” Beyond appearance, for Garate the interest of images is significant: “The results of our research coincide with the vision that has recently been strengthened of our species. And it is that we have more and more data to say that by the time our species came here it had the capacity to make such paintings, it was not progressively and gradually developing that capacity”.

Garate would like to continue investigating in Altxerri: “Now it would be nice to date the stalactites at the entrance, as they began to be created when the entrance was closed, and if they give it to us, for example, 20,000 years, we know that the paintings are older than that.”