Prehistoric Art

Altamira Cave Paintings

 Discovered in 1897 by a father and
his daughter

 Paintings were about the Ice Age
14,000 to 24,000 years ago
 Shoulder bones of buffalo have been
used as palettes
 Brushes were from bristles from the
tail of a buffalo
 Ochre earth was ground up for red
and yellow
 Soot was used for the darker shades
 Greenish color from manganese oxide
mixed with fat made the paintings
stay on the wall
 Lascaux Cave Paintings

 Discovered in 1940 by four boys
 Cave paintings show gigantic oxen, deer, and horses
painted in gray, black, and yellow
 Other caves were later discovered
 Chauvet Cave Paintings
 Near the Ardeche River in Southern
France
 The oldest ever discovered being
35,000 years old

 Shows thick-maned horses, bison,
lions, wild oxen
 With 420 animal figures in all and
with a total over 300 paintings of
animalsin 13 different species
 Dominant animals found are lions,
mammoths and rhinoceroses
 Owls, hyenas and panthers which
have never or rarely found in
previous Ice Age paintings are also
depicted.
 The most spectacular images are the
Horse Panel which is 20 feet long and
the Panel of Lions and Rhinoceroses
Stonehenge
  Can be considered as
one of the oldest forms
of architecture
 It served as a huge
calendar, which
marked the equinox of
the position of the
sun’s rays upon the
structure
 It could foretell the
occurrence of lunar
and solar eclipses