1961-12-23 — Page 3

The boys who looked

cel Ravidat, to drop through it.

The others followed. To their surprise, they found Marcel and the dog in a wide, dark tunnel high enough to stand up in.

By the light of matches, they groped their way along the tun- nel for about 25 yards. It opened Into a natural, oval-shaped hall with a domed ceiling. There they stopped and looked around in amazement.

For the walls and part of the roof of the hall were covered paintings

with

of

animals.

Strange, paintings in savage black, brown, yellow, and red. The colours were so vivid that looming over the

e-animals, boys, almost seemed to move in the flickering light.

SPOTTED

back

-by-

ROBERT

WRAIGHT

red, black, brown and violet, that bamed the boys.

They stumbled out into the light above ground with excitement.

breathless

After six days they could keep They

schoolmaster

10

There was an enormous, weird their secret no longer. antelope-like beast, with long told their straight horns, and spots on its Montignac. flanks. Huge bulls, painted in startling black, stared from the rock. One was 1811. long! There were little horses, too, and tiny sheep. When a boy

found it as smooth as glass.

He listened believed them.

in silence.

at that

15,000 years

PARIS.

FRANCE

Lascaux

Where the paintings were found.

it is agreed they are at least He 18,000 years old.

The intense interest of Abbe. time Breuil and archaeologists all

Even though hesitantly touched one of the paintings, he France was occupied by the over the world in the paintings Germans, the experts began to at Lascaux springs from the fact arrive within days. Among them that the study of such Stone was France's famous archaeolo- Age art can contribute enor- gist, the Abbe Breuil. mously to our knowledge early Man.

But when they came out of the cave they swore a pact of -secrecy. No one else should discovery until fully

know of their themselves

they

explored it.

had

It tells

of time.

animal easier to catch and kill

In other words, there was a concreted, an elaborate system primitive belief that by painting of doors protects them froma an animal the hunters made the abspheric changes, and there is a team of guides to provide information. Yet there i sl)- an atmosphere of magic mystery about them.

This is supported by the pre- sence among the animal figures of the mysterious squares and other signs. So far these have eluded identification.

and.

II you go there, as I did But it recently, you will find that seems likely they are either re- among the guides are Marqcă. presentations of commonplace Ravidat and Jacques Marsal,- things like traps, plants, and two of the oʻginal four Dəya tribal emblems, or sorcerers' who 'discovered the caves. symbols calculated to cast spells over the animals.

Today the Lascaux

Caves

Ravidat and Marsal will still tell you about the great day they stood together in the dark- ness and, by the uncertain Hight attract thousands of visitors auf matches, looked back across year. They are lighted by elec- tricity, their floors have been

NEW

of

us that men had that dawn

Marcel Ravidat and his friends led them up the hill to the caves, and watched while learned to paint in Abbe, then 64, scrambled

the The next day, they came back into the cave and shone a torch they lived. with ropes and a makeshift on the walls. Jantern and went down into the ground again.

Beyond the "hall of the great bulls," which they had seen on the first day, they found a nar- gallery where they were again --surrounded by an amaz- ing display of paintings.

TOW

30,000?

more

the

It tells much of how

If Abbe Breuil was right, then Man was an accomplished artist many thousands of years earlier than had been previously be. lieved and existing theories about him had to be revised.

Within a short time this most eminent of experts on cave that paintings announced But why were the LasCRITE

pictures in the Caves of Lascaux paintings done? Only a few

On the walls they could make were than 17,000 and fints, several crude lamps, large out a big stag with magnificent possibly as much as 30,000 years quantities of charcoal and a antlers and near life-size cuw old. scrap of rope were found in the

that appeared to be jumping caves. Obviously no

After the condition one

& Hine of small, woolly of the lived in them. Apparently men painted rock faces at Lascaux had been studied and the floors only came there to paint and examined for draw animals. But why? archaeological remains, Abbe Breuil narrowed down his original opinion of the age of the paintings.

over

horses.

SWIMMING

MYSTERY

had

No one now seriously believes that the pictures were the result

His unsurpassed knowledge of Above their heads three more the styles and techniques of cave cows and another horse stood artista, added to the evidence out strongly against the natural supplied by natural history about whiteness of the vaulted ceiling, when the animals in the paint Some of the animals were ings lived in the region, brought of art for art's sake, that the several feet long, others only him to the conclusion that the artists were driven simply by an inches long. The boys crawled correct date Was somewhere urge to draw and paint. Nor are on all fouri along a low tunnel, around 20,000 B.C. leading from the other side of the hall, and found another. bigger gallery.

Here a line of stags' heads--

REVEALING

their chins raised, their antlers When fragments found at

15,000 years.

—(London Express Sertića),

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they likely to have been simplyAvailable at all leading Department Stores & Toy Shopt, decorations for a tribal meeting place.

The theory now most com-¡ monly accepted is that the caves at hunting! the paintings

swept back-showed with stag Lascaux were submitted to were visited only gering reallan that the artist - laboratory tests in America they times and that had drawn the animals swim- were pronounced

There was A gigantic years old.

to be 15,500 were believed

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ming.

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