Archaeologists have discovered tens of thousands of prehistoric paintings of animals and humans in a remote area of Colombia. Some now-extinct animals are depicted, meaning the art is likely more than 12,500 years old.
Image: Jörg Denzer
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These are rock paintings that take your breath away: Stretched across almost 12 kilometers (8 miles) of cliff face, there are geometric shapes along with tens of thousands of images of animals and humans, including fish, turtles, lizards and birds, people dancing or holding hands, figures with masks, and lots of handprints.
The most fascinating thing is how incredibly detailed and lifelike some of the paintings are.Image: Jörg Denzer
Animals that have long since become extinct, such as giant sloths, Ice Age horses, or the palaeolama, a type of ancient camel, are also depicted.
It is already clear that it will take decades for all the pictures to be documented and analyzed.Image: Jörg Denzer
There is even a picture of amastodon, a prehistoric relative of the elephant that has not inhabited South America for the last 12,000 years. These paintings would seem to make it clear that the rock art was created more than 12,500 years ago.
Archaeologists found pieces of ocher that were scraped off to make the images, which are painted in a reddish terra-cotta color.
Some of the paintings are so high up on the rock face that they can be viewed only with drones. Image: Jörg Denzer
Kept secret for a documentary
The fascinating rock paintings were discovered in 2017 by a British-Colombian team of researchers, but the sensational find was kept secret ahead of a British Channel 4 series being shown in December, "Jungle Mystery: Lost Kingdoms of the Amazon."
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It is not surprising that this Ice Age art has remained undiscovered for so long: The site is located in the Serrania de la Lindosa mountain range in the middle of the Colombian jungle, about 400 kilometers southeast of the capital, Bogota. On satellite images, the area around the Serrania de la Lindosa simply looks green; to the north, the Rio Guaviare meanders through the dense Amazon rainforest.
During the civil war, FARC rebels claimed the areaImage: picture alliance/AP Photo/R. Abd
To compound the difficulty of getting to the site, the region was controlled by FARC rebels until not so long ago and was thus completely inaccessible to archaeologists. Not until very recently, after the FARC guerrillas and the Colombian government finally negotiated a ceasefire following 50 years of civil war, were archaeologists able to venture into the remote area.
Similar paintings in Chiribiquete National Park
The images are strongly reminiscent of the more than 20,000 rock paintings discovered years ago in neighboring Chiribiquete National Park.
More than 20,000 drawings of animals and humans were also found in ChibiriqueteImage: Leonardo Munoz/Agencia EFE/imago images
These paintings prove that people lived in the area as far back as 19,000 years ago and decorated rock faces with scenes of hunting, dancing and eating.
The newly discovered rock paintings are similar to the paintings in Chiribiquete National ParkImage: Guillermo Legaria/AFP
Archaeologists hope the recent sensational find will give them new insights into the lives of people in the Amazon region during the Ice Age. The paintings will not only provide more information on the animals and plants that existed at that time, but also give clues about how people communicated with each other and what shamanic rituals they had. It is already clear that it will take decades for all the pictures to be documented and analyzed.
Lascaux cave paintings in France were discovered 80 years ago
The cave drawings of animals are thought to date back to the Stone Age. Discovered by accident, the ancient artwork has been replicated twice in order to protect the originals from deteriorating.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
Lascaux cave discovered in 1940
Lascaux is in southwest France. In September 1940, four teenagers discovered the cave — actually a series of connecting chambers — containing ancient Upper Paleolithic art. To protect the drawings, the cave was closed to visitors in 1963. In 1983, a partial copy of the cave was opened. However, it was located too close to the original, so a new, complete copy was built further from the real cave.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
Strikingly realistic
This red cow is among the 1,963 drawings dating back 20,000 years that were found in the Lascaux cave. The pigment has faded over the millennia. According to experts, the original and copy are indistinguishable from each other.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
The Chinese horse
The cave artists used mineral-based pigments, which is why researchers cannot precisely pinpoint when the art originated. They based their estimate on other objects found in the cave, like spearheads made of bones and horns that were decorated with symbols similar to those found on the walls.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
The Lascaux workshop
The replica exhibition, located in an international center for cave art called Lascaux 4, includes information for visitors. After viewing the complete replica, individual paintings are displayed at eye-level in a section called the Lascaux workshop. What do the numbers mean? Lascaux I is the original cave, Lascaux 2 is the first reproduction, and Lascaux 3 is a traveling exhibition.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
Overlapping paintings
Many generations of artists were at work in the cave, and paintings and engravings were created on top of older ones, which is difficult for non-experts to make out. In the Lascaux workshop, individual artworks are projected onto a screen in chronological order. A herd of horses is hidden beneath the large cow and upon closer inspection, a three-sided emblem becomes visible.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
Details spring to life
Wild horses gallop across the wall, jumping, frolicking and mating. But in the cave, they are covered up by a large black cow. In the pedagogical portion of the Lascaux 4 center, the various layers of paintings are separated and the details made visible thanks to modern technology.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
Cave was a haven, not a home
Archaeologist Jean-Pierre Chadelle is one of the experts who has worked in the Lascaux cave. People never lived in the original cave, he said, because no trash or remains of fires have been found there. It's possible that the cave was used as a refuge from snow storms. The artworks originated during the Ice Age, when the Alpine glaciers extended to what is now the city of Lyon.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
International Center for Cave Art
The long gray structure right next to the replicated Lascaux cave, which blends right into the surroundings, was designed by the Norwegian architecture firm Snohetta. A path leads from the flat roof to the hidden entrance of the cave replica, which is located eight meters (26 feet) underground.
Image: DW/B.Kaps
Tracing art then and now
After visiting Lascaux, Picasso is rumored to have said, "We've learned nothing since then!" In the center, the "Galerie de l'imaginaire," or imagination gallery, shows how cave paintings are connected to modern and contemporary art. In this interactive digital gallery, visitors can build their own exhibition with old and new works of art.
