We visited the CAO museum today where we saw 30,000 year-old rock art. This is contemptuous with the cave art we saw on our French trio a few years ago. There is a lot of similarity between the two. Initially, both displayed only animals. Depiction of humans came much later. We have proof of a robust trade with other humans over large distances. The cave art used colors that weren’t available locally. The rock art uses lines etched into shale rock using tools made from flint. Flint is not available locally. Both sometimes depicted animals with two heads to indicate motion.

There is also a lot that is different. Cave art was more expressive of the spirit of the animals. It’s more difficult to scratch lines than it is to paint. Paint can be used to express more than an etched line. Cave artists often used the three-dimensional cave rock to make the depiction more life-like. Rock artists were stuck using shale, which is flat.

I’m including just one picture which clearly shows a cow. The other pictures are of less interest to most folks. Some of the images are high-definition (which makes opening the page take way too long). If you want to see the other pics, click the link at the top of the page. Be prepared to wait.

I hope this finds all doing well.

Early rock art displayed only four animals.

Here’s our museum guide, along with a copy of a rock.

Here’s a second rock. You will see more if you zoom in. If memory serves, this rock has over 60 animals. I zoomed into the upper left corner to display the cow in the Email version of this blog.