The Art of the Ardèche Caves

The adorned caves are all located in the lower valley of the Ardèche and its immediate surroundings. During the Paleolithic period, this valley was a climate refuge with favorable living conditions thanks to the availability of many mineral, animal, and plant resources.

The Ardèche is one of the two european areas where Paleolithic parietal art was found.

In 1889, during a speech before the Anthropology Society of Lyon, Leopold Chiron (1845-1916) announced that he had found in the Chabot Cave, starting from 1878, "lines engraved in the rock more than 5 millimeters deep [less than an inch]," thinking that they are representations of birds and persons. It was in 1879 that the parietal art of the Altamira Cave (Spain) was found.

Nestled in the last meander downstream on the river, the Chabot Cave is especially famous for an engraved frieze, 3 m (1.2 in) long and 80 cm (31.5 in) high with intertwining mammoths. Called the 'cave of mammoths', this 215 m (235 yd) long cave has other engraved figures.

The Chabot Cave also has lithic (stone) tools dated between 22,000 and 17,000 years before the year 1950 (this year is taken as the reference point rather than the year of the birth of Jesus Christ). The parietal representations are dated from this period, corresponding to the Glacial Maximum (20,000 years before). Registered on the List of Historic Monuments since 1903, this cave cannot be visited.

The walls of the Figuier Cave have been exposed to glacial cold. This explains why it is difficult to decipher the Paleolithic figures. Like that of the Chabot Cave, the art of the Figuier Cave is attributed to the Solutrean culture, which dates back 20,000 years.

The Figuier Cave has also been registered in the List of Historical Monuments since 2017, mainly because of the importance of its archeological heritage from the Mousterian (Neanderthals) to the Upper Paleolithic.

The cave is richly decorated with fine intertwined engravings, including five mammoths, an ibex (wild mountain goat), and a large shaded bison whose contours of the back and hindquarters had been previously highlighted with red ocher.

Further into the cave, three aurochs (large wild cattle), a mammoth, and an impressive horned ibex are seen in the art of this small cave, which may have been decorated around 20,000 years before our time.

The animal, with such typical lyre-shaped horns, seems to be standing on guard. The back line is dominated by 19 red dots. Two heads of ibexes are outlined under the chest of the auroch. The cave has been registered in the List of Historical Monuments since 1964.

The rock art of the Baume d'Oulen is attributed to the Solutrean (22,000 to 17,000 years before the present day), which includes the Glacial Maximum in particular. The Baume d'Oulen has been occupied as evidenced by bone and lithic artifacts.

The cave has been registered in the French List of Historical Monuments since 1911.

The engravings of the shelter are quite similar to those of the cave with similar subjects and style.

Archeological excavations have revealed bone artifacts, including tips of spears (projectile hunting weapon), harpoons for fishing, and needles. These have been attributed to the end of the Magdalenian (12,000 years before the present day). The Colombier Cave is registered in the French List of Historical Monuments (1995).

The engravings are located at the rear of the cave in a chamber accessible through a corridor of over 300 ft.

The cave contains around 70 parietal engravings, including 19 horses, 10 aurochs, six ibexes, four deer, two bisons, a mammoth, a big cat, and 13 other indeterminate animal figures. The style of the parietal figures of the Ebbou Cave is remarkable for its simplicity.

The cave has been registered in the French List of Historical Monuments since 1947.

The Gorges of the Ardèche river is an important site for the study of Paleolithic rock art in Europe. The majority of the decorated caves contain animal symbolic art consisting of large herbivores. Most of the caves are attributed to the Solutrean culture, i.e. 22,000 to 17,000 years before the present day.

This status, attributed to the lower Ardèche valley for the study of parietal art, is reinforced by the discovery of the Chauvet Cave which has considerably extended the chronological spectrum of this art and its stylistic and symbolic richness.

The end of the ice age around 12,000 years ago is marked by the appearance of rock art called "schematic art." This is a mode of representations that we owe to the first sedentary communities making a living from agriculture and livestock. These rock representations are very refined, limiting themselves to the essentials and exhibiting no wish to depict naturalistic figures as parietal art did.