The Altamira Cave

The Altamira cave

Introduction

30 meters after the lobby, is the great room of the polychromes. It is here where most of the drawings and engravings are that we have all seen in photographs. The area occupies a space 18 meters long by 9 meters wide. One of the things that impresses us when observing the drawings made in the Polychromes room is the realism they project before the viewers’ view. The formations and bulges of the rock were used to create volume to the figures and thus give it a more realistic effect. Such is the case of the shrunken bison, a world -famous figure that was painted taking advantage of the curvature of the rock.

Developing

One of the most repeated animals in the engravings and drawings of the Altamira cave is the bison. Then there are deer, wild boars and horses. There is evidence in the drawings of the presence of animals such as mammoth and reindeer. This gallery completes a series of anthropomorphic figures and some symbols.

The way they were painted (in herdas) can reflect the lifestyle a bit and the way these animals moved. Impress at first glance the size that these paintings come to acquire. Some of the drawings are 1.80 meters like that of the shrunken bison and the great deer that comes to measure 2.25 meters long.

The Great Cierva

The Great Cierva is a work worth contemplating without neglecting the details that the artist put to do it. Its limbs are very well stylized, but they keep a disproportion with the trunk part.

The head includes very clear and marked details of the eyes, ears and snout. These disproportion can be due to the lack of distance between the cave roof and the painter’s point of view.

This room completes one of the figures recognized as the oldest to be carried out: the ocher horse. It is located at one end of the roof of what we would call the vault.

End of the Altamira Cave

After the polychromes room there are some narrower ramifications turned into rooms that end in a place known as a horse tail. In these ramifications there are abundant signs and geometric figures well defined as cones, rectangles and circles. In the horse tail there is also the presence of drawings and engravings of animals in black color. This area of the cave lacks natural light so the authors of these works must have worked crouched and with artificial light support. In the horsette.

conclusion

Geological studies have determined that the type of rock present in the Altamira cave is limestone with brown yellow with calcite and siderite components. Thanks to the most advanced techniques such as carbon test 14, it was found that the paintings made in the Altamira cave are 13 ago 13.500 years. The corresponding period is the Magdalenian, one of the most advanced cultures of the upper Paleolithic. The original height of the cave does not exceed 2 meters. Excavation work on the floor were done in order to reduce the level to give more height to the cave and thus facilitate the best observation of the drawings.