page_title: Cave of La Pasiega
section_title: Gallery C (room XI), 3rd Sanctuary
hierarchical_section_title: Cave of La Pasiega / Cave paintings / Gallery C (room XI), 3rd Sanctuary
caption_attribution_description: Plano de la Galería C (tercer santuario) de la Cueva de La Pasiega, en el monte Castillo, localidad de Puente Viesgo (Cantabria, España)
context_page_description: Cueva de La Pasiega, or Cave of La Pasiega, situated in the Spanish municipality of Puente Viesgo, is one of the most important monuments of Paleolithic art in Cantabria. It is included in the UNESCO World Heritage List since July 2008, as part of the inscription: "Cave of Altamira and palaeolithic cave art of Northern Spain."
  It is located in the heart of the uniprovincial community, in the middle of the Pas River valley, around the cave of Hornos de la Pena and Monte Castillo, in the same group of caves as Las Monedas, Las Chimeneas, and the cave of El Castillo. The caves of Monte Castillo form an amazingly complete series, both as regards the material culture of the Old Stone Age and from an artistic point of view. La Pasiega is basically an enormous gallery, its known extent more than 120 meters, that runs more or less parallel to the slope of the mount, opening to the surface at six different places: six small mouths, the majority obstructed, of which two can be accessed for inspection. The principal gallery is approximately 70 meters and opens to deeper secondary galleries, winding and labyrinthine, which in places broaden out to form large chambers.
context_section_description: Access to Gallery C is found, after entering the cave, by a way through to the left crossing Gallery D. Along there opens "Room XI" of Gallery C. This, in the same way as Gallery B, has direct communication with the outside, despite the fact that it is obstructed by rubble and rocks which have certainly been introduced. Once again, the perception of the arrangement of the pictures is changed for the observer by the problem of the blocked entrances, as we have noticed in the second Sanctuary.
  Leroi-Gourhan differentiates two clear parts to this sanctuary, located in separate places within the same room, and with different themes, technique and chronology. In addition there are two ibexes in the original monograph indicated at number 67, produced in partial block color by a kind of modeling and black in color, a method which is not found in any of the remaining figures of the room.
  The First Large Group of Room XI is the one found mainly around the presumed original entrance, now blocked. It contains mainly hinds, some stags, various cattle and a pair of horses, and also there is a goat. There are other symbols difficult to identify, some seeming to be animals, others anthropomorphs, and there is a positive hand impression colored black, dotted signs, rod signs, and other ideomorphs, among which stands out the so-called "Trampa" (a kind of column which encloses, behind a symbol, a bison and a hind (more will be said of this anon). The arrangement of this group seems to correspond to a threefold or ternary structure with variations: bos-equus-cervus  with various signs or bos-equus-anthropomorph with signs. The truth is that the complexity of this panel is great, given the concentration of very varied figures.
  Clearly the dominant technique is red outline drawing, but in one of the panels is also found, for some deer, striated engraving of very fine execution: also, there are various figures in black. In addition, there is two-color work on one of the cattle, in which red block painting and black lines are combined, this time a repainting of different date. The presumed anthropomorph seems to contain up to three colors, not a very usual thing in palaeolithic art (red, black and yellow). There are some yellow figures.
  The Second Large Group is around the access area to Zone D, that is, on the opposite side of the room. The species represented show predominantly horses, followed by cattle, and fewer but certainly present are deer and ibex (for which the symbols are complementary to the foregoing group). The symbols are of indeterminate number, and are of distinct kind, including key-shaped and feather-shaped ones, and also barred and dotted ones. The reduction in number of the deer does not happen in any other parts of the cave, where they are in the majority, whereas the proportion of horses is increased.
  Here the arrangement is also complex. All the ideomorphs are in the area nearest to the cave mouth, and the overlays show repaintings, maybe in distinct periods. There are three possible sub-groups of horses without cattle (only two of the compositions are the typical A-B which have been observed up to this point). However, there are plenty of isolated figures, above all round the entrance to the room from Zone D.
  The dominant techniques are engraving of multiple lines, as if striated, and black painting: the yellows, reds and ochres are fewer. However, there is an example of the two-color work, in one representation, although it is not very prominent. As we have seen, the technique is also distinct from that of the earlier group and confirms the separation of the two areas within the room.
caption: Plan and schema of the rock paintings of Gallery C, 3rd Sanctuary
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