Chauvet Cave is one of the oldest rock art sites in the world, dating to the Aurignacian period in France, about 30,000-32,000 years ago. The site is located in the Pont-d'Arc Valley of Ardèche, France. Paintings in the cave include animals (reindeer, horses, aurochs, rhinocerus, buffalo), hand prints, and a series of dots.
Archaeological material in the site include bear bones, an ibex skull, and clear at the rear of the cave, a preserved human footprint. It was discovered in 1994 by Jean-Marie Chauvet; the relatively recent discovery of an intact cave painting site has let researchers control the excavations, allowing them to protect the site and its data. Since 1996, the site has been under investigation by an international team led by Jean Clottes, combining geology, hydrology, paleontology, and conservation studies.
The dating of the cave is based on 46 AMS radiocarbon dates taking on tiny pieces of paint from the walls, as well as conventional c14 dates on human and animal bone--and has led to a revision of the notion of paleolithic cave art styles. However, Pettitt has recently questioned the dates, suggesting that the cave art dates to no earlier than about 27,000 BP.
Sources
This glossary entry is part of the About.com Guide to Prehistoric Cave Art.
Abadía, Oscar M. and Manuel R. G. Morales 2007 Thinking about 'style' in the 'post-stylistic era': reconstructing the stylistic context of Chauvet. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 26(2):109-125.
Clottes, Jean and David Lewis-Williams 1996 Upper Palaeolithic cave art: French and South African collaboration. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 6(1):137-163.
Pettitt, Paul in press Art and the Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition in Europe: Comments on the archaeological arguments for an early Upper Paleolithic antiquity of the Grotte Chauvet art. Journal of Human Evolution in press.
