Pech Merle

[visited May 08] Wow oh wow. Once in a while a visit to a site created by our ancestors lifts me well out of the mundane and into a state unlike any other. The glorious paintings here did just that. I’ve seen a lot of Neolithic and bronze age rock art in the UK and I’ve seen the 11,000 BP engravings at Cresswell crags but this is a whole different ball game.

Photo taking is banned so you’ll need to have a look at the link to the attached visitor’s centers website. [edit] Or look at the Public Domain images....

I walked about in a state of disbelief looking at paintings of human representations pierced by a spear, mammoths, bison, ‘female symbols’ aka triangles, a bears head and amazing dotted horses which were carbon dated to 25,000 BP. There is also very old animal bones and unbelievably 10000 year old footprints. The paintings range from 25,000 BP to 10,000 BP.

Oh and then there is the geology, this cave would be renowned for that even if the paintings weren’t here.

Superb to see something that puts the mere 3-4000 years back to stonehenge into stark perspective.

Access is down stairs and occasionally slippery under foot as you walk on the floor of the cave system.