Pech Merle
Pech Merle is a cave with paleolithic cave paintings. It is located in the southwest of France in the village of Cabrerets near the town of Cahors and belongs to the complex of the Franco-Cantabrian cave art.
- 5.1 Literature
- 6.1 External links
General
The cave is located on the territory of the municipality in the department of Lot Cabrerets. The Coordinates are: 44 ° 30 ' 29 " N, 1 ° 38' 40 " O44.5080555555561.6444444444444Koordinaten: 44 ° 30 ' 29 " N, 1 ° 38' 40 " O.
To protect the petroglyphs before the breath of visitors who can only 700 visitors visit the cave every day. Photographing in the cave is prohibited.
Geography
The entrance is located at 280 meters above sea level between the rivers sagne and Cele.
History
The earliest drawings are dated to an age of about 20,000 years. Their investigation began in 1914. 1922 were discovered the Stone Age drawings. The explorers were the student André David and Henri Dutertre. In 1923 the present entrance was dug to the cave.
The Cave
The cave is divided into several rooms and sightseeing points. The main points are listed here.
Hall of the broken pillar and black frieze
Here is a broken column and you can see the shifts of a limestone slab. In this room drawings of horses, bison and mammoths are found. The age of the drawings is about 16,000 and 20,000 years ago. The drawings are created with charcoal.
Hall of the rock art
In this room, a 40 m wide gallery can be seen. Pictured are horses, bison, fish and hand negatives. This means that the hands were placed on the wall and therefore with a blowpipe red color ( red chalk ) was blown. A study of 2011 showed that during the Gravettiens actually horses with leopard markings were, which could correspond to the dotted horses of Pech Merle in their phenotype.
In this hall and the gyro can be found. Here have, in supersaturated with calcium carbonate water, formed as residues of flowing water, a gyro and many pearls.
Ceiling of the hieroglyphs
Here there is a vault with a height of 40 m. The partly very old drawings mammoths and female body parts.
Bison women
In this area there are eight silhouettes of women to find. Next to it is stylized bison.
Footprints
In a dry part of the cave to find human footprints. The 12,000 -year-old tracks come from a child.
Bear Gallery
The name derives from scratch traces of bears that can be found here.
Combel Gallery
In the center of the gallery is an oak root which has a length of about 12 m and extends from the ceiling at right angles through the air down to the ground.