http://SaturnianCosmology.Org/ mirrored file For complete access to all the files of this collection see http://SaturnianCosmology.org/search.php ========================================================== cosquer cave rock art cosquer cosquer cosquer cosquer cosquer cave cosquer cave cosquer redécouvert bradshaw foundation bradshaw foundation bradshaw foundation rock art cosquer cosquer cave Some of the results we have obtained during our research – in addition to the inventory of the art, to numerous details relating to the art (animals and original signs), to the use of the cave and to the people who frequented it –, are the following: cosquer cave A number of small animal engravings - which had been seen in 1992 but had remained unstudied - are to be found on the slanting wall next to the big now submerged shaft, which we have called the Big Shaft. They are difficult of access because the water is quite deep at the foot of the wall. The lower level of the water during our second spell of field work in 2003 has enabled us to spend more time there and to take close-ups of those engravings and of the black hand stencils nearby. Contrary to what we had thought first, we found out that they had been done before the hand stencils, because one of those hand stencils was on top of these engravings. This means that part of the animals were done during what we called Phase 1 by the Gravettians, between 26,000 and 28,000 BP, which is an important new fact; cosquer cave In addition to the phallus already described (Clottes, Courtin, Collina-Girard 1996), other sexual symbols, both male and female, have been observed. In particular, a few natural hollows on the walls have been marked with black to transform them into female sexual organs; cosquer cave *A hole surrounded and* *marked with black to * *evoke a female sex *Photo J. Clottes cosquer cave Among the rare objects found in the cave are a Pecten shell in which a big live coal had been put, a piece of clay which has been kneaded and bears distinct traces of fingers and nails, and also a flat calcite plaque which was worked and used as a makeshift lamp. cosquer cosquer *A shell with a big * *charcoal in it *Photo L. Vanrell *This 21.7cm long calcite * *plaque was used as a lamp *Photo J. Clottes cosquer Handprints of children have been observed in the mondmilch (i.e. the white altered soft surface of the limestone wall) of relatively high walls, at more than eight feet from the ground. This means that kids did have access to the deepest parts of the cave, and also that they were held up at arm's length or on the shoulders of grown-ups so that they could imprint their hands high up on the surface of the walls. This cannot be construed as a random gesture but as a very deliberate action; cosquer As to the grown-ups themselves, some of them must have been at least six feet tall to have been able to make engravings where they did, in the impossibility of using ladders in those particular places; *Child handprint high up on a wall */(right)/ Photo J. Clottes cosquer cosquer A number of broken stalactites and stalagmites have been observed in numerous places. This is neither gratuitous vandalism nor a destruction meant to facilitate going from one place to the other, as most of them are in places where they could not get in the way. In most cases, the broken pieces have not been found. We have also carefully examined the stalagmites and stalactites located in the higher parts of the cave, in passages which remained unreachable to prehistoric people and where not a single trace or charcoal was ever found: those concretions have never been broken. This proves that the breakage we have noticed cannot have been due to natural causes like earthquakes; *Broken stalagmites with the tops calcited * *over and the pieces removed */(right)/ Photo J. Clottes cosquer cosquer All over the cave, in the parts which remained above the water, the surface of the walls has been scraped and thousands of traces of the scraping are inscribed there (see photographs below). The red clay was used as a makeshift pigment to make the red hand stencils. The whitish mondmilch (degraded surface of the limestone walls) has been removed, sometimes as deep as one or two inches. From the superimpositions of engravings and paintings we can tell that these activities took place during the main two periods when the cave was frequented. At the foot of the walls or vaults where they scraped the surfaces, when the ground is intact, very few traces remain. One must conclude that they took the white mondmilch away for their own purposes. cosquer cosquer *One of the chambers of Cosquer* *with the ceilings scraped wherever* *they are not calcited over *Photo L. Vanrell *The wall has been scraped just * *above the auks, after breaking * *the thin calcite covering *Photo J. Clottes cosquer cosquer *Examples of finger tracings * *on a ceiling *Photo J. Clottes *Ceiling with finger marks * *and scraping of mondmilch *Photo J. Clottes We have researched the uses to which calcium carbonate powder from broken stalactites and stalagmites as well as mondmilch have been put in the course of history (see Shaw in Hill & Forti 1997, Clottes, Courtin, Vanrell 2005). The oldest uses known in pharmacopeias are in China (stalactites and stalagmites) (4th and 1st century BC). As late as in the 19th century in China and in the 18th in Europe (including mondmilch), they were consistently used as medicines for all sorts of ailments and treatments: treatment of fevers (to encourage sweating), heart conditions (when diet was poor in calcium), to stop bleeding, to curb diarrhea, for the relief of cough, and to aid the production of milk in wet-nurses, for strengthening broken bones, for drying up of abscesses, ulcers and wounds. Even nowadays, calcium carbonate (CaCo3) is widely used for osteoporosis (together with D vitamin), to help with bone regeneration and for problems relating to growth, for pregnant women and feeding mothers, to relieve tiredness, etc. Originally, about 27,000 years ago, people scraped powder from the walls and took away fragments of stalactites and stalagmites from the deeper parts of the cave probably because they believed that these stones were charged with supernatural power. The fact that the poultices and/or medicines did work in some cases cannot have passed unnoticed and this no doubt accounts for the long continuance of the practice. We may have in the Cosquer Cave, associated to abundant rock art, the very first concrete example of the making of specific medicines in the history of the world. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ | *Page 1 * | *Page 2 * | *Page 3 * | *Page 4 * | *Gallery * | *Acknowledgements * | Cosquer Cave - Prehistoric Images and Medicines Under the Sea Jean Clottes, Jean Courtin, Luc Vanrell www.bradshawfoundation.com Other related sections on the Bradshaw Foundation website: *Paleolithic Art in France* [ *click here * ] *The Chauvet Cave* [ *click here * ] *The Chauvet Paintings Gallery* [ *click here * ] cosquer cave