http://SaturnianCosmology.Org/ mirrored file For complete access to all the files of this collection see http://SaturnianCosmology.org/search.php ========================================================== Corrida The Lascaux shaft "scene" (about 1,5 m in cross-section) suggests some ideas. The scene of the combat of a man and a bull from the Lascaux cave is not unique in the upper Palaeolithic art. A painting close in subject is in the Pindal cave (Spain): a wounded bull aimed his horns at two prostrate figures, one of them also with a marked male sign. The same subject is engraved on an antler from the Laugerie -Basse cave. One can well believe, that an artistic image of a tragic conflict between a man and a bull had appeared almost together with the art itself and remained steadily in all the subsequent periods of history. This theme is still one of the leading in the eurasian artistic folklore from Franco-Cantabrien and Levant on the west up to Pribaikalye and Mongolia on the east. Коррида But to the east from Baikal area and to the north from the boundary between the partially-wooded steppe and the taiga the image of a bull is not met in the ancient imaginative monuments. Ancient cults, connected with a bull, were also widely spread in the eurasian steppes and at the foothills. A very interesting sculptural composition from the bull skulls coated with clay and painted with ochre was found in one of the "temples" of the ancient aeneolithic settlement Chatal-Huyuk In ancient Aeneolithc and Bronze burials one can find the bull's bones, that is, the remains of meat pieces which were put by the relatives in the grave as funeral food for the dead. Judging by the bones the deceased was supplied with the meat of either a wild bison, or a domestic bull. Hence, even after domestication of the bull, the wild-bull-hunting still went on. Developed in the Upper Palaeolithc, the bull cult gradually turned into a sacrifice ritual and spread over the whole eurasian zone of mountains and steppes. It is clearly seen by some finds in the barrows of the catacomb culture (II millenium B.C.). At the catacomb entrance or in the burial mound there are accurately piled bull's skull and bones of four legs (the end parts).It means that during funeral a bull was killed and its skin with the head and four legs, cut off the shoulders or thighs, were ripped off. The skin with the legs and the head were devoted to the dead and the rest carcass was used as a funeral food. Within the boundaries of this theme some subjects with the participation of a man and a bull are of special interest. They are numerous: from the frescoes of the aeneolithic Chatal-Huyuk to Hellenistic Mitra, killing a bull and up to the modern Spanish corrida. The real sources of the mythological subject, probably, lie in the world of the Upper Palaeothic hunters (about 20000 years ago). The wild bull hunting was always very dangerous and required complete mobilization of moral and physical strengths of a person, his deftness, lightning response and thoroughly worked out "technology", which was, obviously taught from the very childhood to make all the skills and methods automatic. A hunter could rely neither on a prolonged fight nor on an escape in flight in case of bad luck: the forces were too unequal. That is why he had to kill the bull almost with one exact stroke. If the stroke did not achieve the aim or was not powerful enough, the infuriated bull rushed at the hunter and the latter's destiny depended on his fast legs or a tree, happily turned up on his way, where he could shelter. On an even place the hunter was doomed to destruction. Archaeological observations give interesting data concerning the combat of a man and a bull. An exceptional discovery, made by Z.A.Abramova during the excavations of the upper palaeolithic settlement korrida Kokorevo I in the Yenisei valley, testifies to the thoroughly worked out technology of the wild- bull- hunting. There a left shoulder-blade of a large 6-7 years old bison was found. A horn head of a dart or of an arrow stuck in it. The sharp edge of the head, having pierced the shoulder-blade, went out almost 4 cm from its inner side. After such a stroke the slightest movement of the left front leg injured the bison greatly because at any movement of the leg the dart edge cut and torn the shoulder and chest muscles under the shoulder-blade. A single wound like that was enough to make the animal quite unable to fight or to escape. That method of hunting, mastered almost 15000 ago, was used during the whole subsequent period of history. The American Indians, while hunting the bisons with a spear or a bow in the XVIII c, used almost the same method. k