The Savannah morning news., 1902-02-16
OLDEST PICTURES MADE BY MAN.
Mammoth, Horses and Oxen Scratch
ed on Walls of the COmbarelles
From the London Daily Graphic.


From the London Daily Graphic.
Among the most interesting of the
discoveries made by the scientists VINO
devote their time to researches into the
Palaeolithic ages-thousands of years
before recorded history begns-are
those which prove that even in those
dim and distant ages man, such as
he was hao aesthetic yearnings. One
of the most important of such discov-
cries has been made in France in the
grotto of Combarelles, near Eyzies,
in Dordogne. The discovery was COM
municated to the Academic des Sci
ences by Messrs. Captain and Breuil
and was accompanied by drawings of
certain figures of animals engraved on
the walls of the grotto on each side
of it's length The drawings are in
some places quite deeply engraved in
the rock: in others they are only
scratched: here and there is an effort
to give a relief to the sketches.
1t was at once evident to the discov-
erers that these remarkable rock draw
ings were identical in character with
those on fragments of bone and horn
of which casts may be seen in the
British Museum. and that the same
striving after truth in rendering the
characteristics of the animals was to
proving thJ familiarity of the artist
with the appearance of the animals
themselves; so that the artist was con-
temporary with the animal he drew.
Now one of these animals being
hairy mammoth and the other a rein
deer it IS evident that when those
creatures roamed the hills and valleys
of South Central France man was also
there-that is to say in the Palaeo-
lithic or Older Stone Age.
"The precision with which the fig
ures are drawn say the discoverers,
"allows us to recognize the species of
the animals so represented. The
equine types are sometimes large
headed, with short stiff manes-some-
times with flowing names and tails
Some of the horses were domestic ami
mails. One of them has on its back a
covering-a palaeolithic horse cloth
others have traces of bits and halters
The bovine types are less frequent;
one of them has the character of GER
tain African antelopes (such as the
gnu), while another is much like our
oxen of to-day. The running reindeer
is identical in character with those
which are engraved on bone and of
the same period. The representations
of the mammoth (of which fourteen
were exhibited to the Academic des
Sciences) are very characteristic. Some
are more hairy than others -
With these rock drawings are strange
signs engraved in the rock; a circle
with the semblance of human features,
double outlined lozenge on the mid
die of the body of one of the horses,
others of Mike shape, semicircle etc,
all of mysterious and unknown signif-
canoe. Since the memorable day when
the first piece of engraved bone was
discovered, embedded in the stalag-
mite of the caverns once tenanted by
human beings, there has been no dis
covery which has caused so great an
interest as this one in the stalagmite
cavern of Combarelles. We have In
these rude and yet skilful efforts of
the human race deeply interesting evil
dence that man once shared with
mammoth and with reindeer the Arctic
plains of Southern France.