By Rafe Calder
In 1879 an amateur archaeologist was led into a cave in northern Spain by his eight-year-old daughter, according to Wikipedia, and recognised the markings on its walls as drawings. Most of the experts of the day did not believe him.
Who found what, and when
Wikipedia says a local tiler, Modesto Cubillas, found the cave in 1868. In 1879 the amateur archaeologist Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola was led there by his daughter and recognised the markings on the walls as drawings. UNESCO, on its World Heritage page, gives the discovery of the cave art as 1879 and credits Sautuola by name. The two accounts are not in conflict. One records the cave, the other the art.
Doubt
Here is the part of the story that matters for anyone wondering why the cave is protected so closely. Wikipedia says experts led by the French specialists Gabriel de Mortillet and Émile Cartailhac rejected a prehistoric origin, and the claims were ridiculed at an 1880 congress in Lisbon. Sautuola was accused of forgery partly because the walls showed no soot. He later found that the artists could have used marrow fat in their lamps, which makes little soot. In 1902 Cartailhac publicly admitted his mistake. Sautuola had died fourteen years earlier.
What is on the ceiling
The Polychrome Ceiling is described by Wikipedia as the cave’s most impressive feature. It shows a herd of extinct steppe bison in different poses, two horses, a large doe and possibly a wild boar. The same article says the artists used charcoal, ochre or hematite, diluted the pigments to vary their strength, and used the natural bulges of the wall to give the animals volume. Handprints, it says, were made by laying a hand on the wall and blowing pigment around it.
How old
Sources give different answers, and Wikipedia says plainly that scientists do not agree on the dating. It puts the earliest paintings at around 36,000 years ago. A 2008 uranium-thorium study, it says, found the paintings were completed over as much as 20,000 years. A 2012 study dated one claviform sign to about 36,160 years and a red horse to about 22,110 years, so the span is over 10,000 years.
UNESCO gives the art as Upper Palaeolithic, 35,000 to 11,000 BP in its summary, but writes “BC” in one English passage. Those are different reference systems, and the page does not explain the difference. We show both and do not choose.
Why it was closed
Wikipedia says the cave was closed to the public completely in 1977, because the breath of visitors, its carbon dioxide and water vapour, was damaging it. It reopened in 1982 for a very small number of people each day, with a waiting list of three years. In 2002 green mould appeared on some paintings and the cave was closed again. In December 2010, it says, the Ministry of Culture decided it would stay closed.
UNESCO’s page is quieter on the subject. It says that access to the caves open to the public is limited by carrying capacity, and that visits are in groups with a guide. It does not say whether Altamira itself is open. Our reading: the two pages describe different moments, and anyone planning a visit should check the museum rather than rely on either.
The copy
Wikipedia says a replica cave and museum near the site was completed in 2001. The museum’s own site, run by the Ministry of Culture, calls the permanent exhibition “Neocave” and “The Times of Altamira”, and gives its address in Santillana del Mar. The Spain tourism site says the museum includes a replica of the cave’s paintings, called the neocave. The museum site gives no description of how the replica was made, so we give none.
Wikipedia lists three other reproductions: one in Madrid’s National Archaeological Museum, one at the Deutsches Museum in Munich, completed in 1964, and one in Japan, completed in 1993.
One site, now eighteen caves
UNESCO says Altamira was inscribed in 1985 and that in 2008 the property was extended by seventeen other decorated caves, so that it now carries the title “Cave of Altamira and Paleolithic Cave Art of Northern Spain”. That makes eighteen in total, spread across Asturias, Cantabria and the Basque Country. The Spanish text on the same UNESCO page gives a different year, 2005, for the Altamira inscription. The English listing says 1985, and we use that.
Dates in order
- 1868: the tiler finds the cave (Wikipedia).
- 1879: Sautuola recognises the paintings (Wikipedia, UNESCO).
- 1880: the Lisbon congress rejects his claim (Wikipedia).
- 1902: Cartailhac admits his mistake (Wikipedia).
- 1977: closed to the public (Wikipedia).
- 1982: reopened to a handful of visitors (Wikipedia).
- 1985: inscribed by UNESCO.
- 2001: the replica cave and museum are completed (Wikipedia).
- 2002: mould; closed again (Wikipedia).
- 2008: boundaries extended to eighteen caves (UNESCO).
- 2010: the ministry decides it stays closed (Wikipedia).
Questions a buyer would ask
Can I go inside the original? We could not confirm. Wikipedia reports a 2010 decision to keep it closed. UNESCO speaks only of limited, guided group access to caves that are open.
Is the replica passed off as the original? The sources do not suggest it. Wikipedia calls it a replica cave, the tourism site calls it a replica of the paintings, and the museum site lists it as part of its exhibition.
Who is the museum run by? According to UNESCO, the Ministry of Culture, through the National Museum and Research Centre of Altamira.
What kind of sources these are
UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre; the museum’s own website, which is official but gave little detail; the national tourism site, which is promotional; and Wikipedia. Names of the replica’s makers are in Wikipedia and are left out.
What we left out
Visiting hours, tickets, any claims about the exact pigments’ chemistry, the replica’s makers, and the dating of individual figures beyond the two studies above.
Quick answers
Who found the paintings at Altamira? According to UNESCO and Wikipedia, Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola recognised them in 1879.
Why was the cave closed? According to Wikipedia, damage from visitors’ breath led to full closure in 1977, and mould in 2002 led to a second closure.
What is the neocave? According to the museum site, part of its permanent exhibition; the tourism site calls it a replica of the cave’s paintings.
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