Graphic image of the drawing on the walls of the caves. Types and features of the art of primitive society

After visiting the caves of Altamira in northern Spain, Pablo Picasso exclaimed: "after the work in Altamira, all art began to decline." He wasn't kidding. The art in this cave and in many other caves that are found in France, in Spain and other countries, is one of the greatest assets in the field of art that has ever been created.

Magura Cave

Magura Cave is one of the largest caves in Bulgaria. It is located in the northwestern part of the country. The walls of the cave are adorned with prehistoric rock paintings dating from about 8,000 to 4,000 years ago. More than 700 drawings were discovered. The pictures show hunters dancing people and many animals.

Cueva de las Manos

Cueva de las Manos is located in Southern Argentina. The name can be literally translated as "Cave of Hands". Most of the images in the cave are left hands, but there are also hunting scenes and images of animals. The paintings are believed to have been created 13,000 and 9,500 years ago.

Bhimbetka

Located in central India, Bhimbetka contains over 600 prehistoric rock paintings. The drawings depict people who lived at that time in a cave. Animals were also given a lot of space. Images of bison, tigers, lions and crocodiles have been found. It is believed that the most old painting 12,000 years.

Serra da Capivara

Serra da Capivara is a national park in the northeast of Brazil. This place is the home of many stone shelters that are decorated with rock paintings that represent ritual scenes, hunting, trees, animals. Some scholars believe that the oldest cave drawings in this park created 25,000 years ago.

Laas Gaal

Laas Gaal is a complex of caves in northwestern Somalia that contain some of the earliest known art on African continent. The prehistoric rock paintings are estimated by scientists to be between 11,000 and 5,000 years old. They show cows, ceremonially dressed people, domestic dogs and even giraffes.

Tadrart Acacus

Tadrart Acacus forms a mountain range in the Sahara desert, in western Libya. The area has been known for its rock paintings since 12,000 BC. up to 100 years. The paintings reflect the changing conditions of the Sahara Desert. 9,000 years ago, the local area was full of greenery and lakes, forests and wild animals, as evidenced by rock paintings depicting giraffes, elephants and ostriches.

Chauvet cave

Chauvet Cave, in the south of France, contains some of the earliest known prehistoric rock art in the world. The images preserved in this cave may be around 32,000 years old. The cave was discovered in 1994 by Jean Marie Chauvet and his team of cavers. The paintings found in the cave represent images of animals: mountain goats, mammoths, horses, lions, bears, rhinos, lions.

rock painting cockatoo

located on northern territory Australia, Kakadu National Park contains one of the largest concentrations of Aboriginal art. The oldest works are believed to be 20,000 years old.

Cave of Altamira

Discovered in the late 19th century, the Altamira Cave is located in northern Spain. Surprisingly, the paintings found on the rocks were such High Quality that scientists have long doubted their authenticity and even accused the discoverer Marcelino Sanz de Sautuola of forging paintings. Many do not believe in intellectual potential primitive people. Unfortunately, the discoverer did not live to see 1902. In this uphill the paintings were found to be authentic. The images are made with charcoal and ocher.

Paintings by Lascaux

The Lascaux Caves, located in the southwest of France, are adorned with impressive and famous rock paintings. Some of the images are 17,000 years old. Most of the rock paintings are depicted far from the entrance. Most famous images this cave - images of bulls, horses and deer. The largest rock art in the world is the bull in Lascaux Cave, which is 5.2 meters long.

Prehistoric rock art is the most abundant evidence available of how mankind took the first steps in the field of art, knowledge and culture. It is found in most countries of the world, from the tropics to the Arctic, and in a wide variety of places - from deep caves to mountain heights.

Several tens of millions of rock paintings and artistic motifs have already been discovered, and more and more are being discovered every year. This solid, durable, cumulative monument of the past is clear evidence that our distant ancestors developed complex social systems.

Some common false claims about the origins of art should have been rejected at their very source. Art, as such, did not appear suddenly, it developed gradually with the enrichment of human experience. By the time the famous cave art appeared in France and Spain, it is believed that artistic traditions have already been fairly developed, at least in South Africa, Lebanon, Eastern Europe, India and Australia, and, no doubt, in many other regions that have yet to be explored accordingly.

When did people first decide to generalize reality? This is an interesting question for art historians and archaeologists, but it is also of broad interest, given that the idea of ​​cultural primacy has an impact on the formation of ideas about racial, ethnic and national value, even fantasy. For example, the claim that art originated in the caves of Western Europe becomes an incentive to create myths about European cultural superiority. Secondly, the origins of art should be considered closely connected with the emergence of other purely human qualities: the ability to create abstract ideas and symbols, to communicate at the highest level, to develop an idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthemselves. Apart from prehistoric art, we have no real evidence from which to infer the existence of such abilities.

THE BEGINNINGS OF ART

Artistic creativity was considered a model of "impractical" behavior, that is, behavior that seemed to be devoid of a practical goal. The oldest clear archaeological evidence of this is the use of ocher or red iron ore (hematite), a red mineral dye removed and used by people several hundred thousand years ago. These ancient people also collected crystals and patterned fossils, colorful and unusual shape gravel. They began to distinguish between ordinary, everyday objects and unusual, exotic ones. Obviously, they developed ideas about a world in which objects could be distributed into different classes. Evidence first appears in South Africa, then in Asia, and finally in Europe.

The oldest known rock painting was made in India two or three hundred thousand years ago. It consists of bowl-shaped depressions and a sinuous line chiselled into the sandstone of the cave. Around the same time, on various kinds of portable objects (bones, teeth, tusks and stones) found at the sites of parking primitive man, simple linear signs were made. Sets of carved lines collected in a bundle first appear in the central and Eastern Europe, they acquire a certain beautification, which makes it possible to recognize individual motifs: scribbles, crosses, arcs and sets of parallel lines.

This period, which archaeologists call the Middle Paleolithic (somewhere between 35,000 and 150,000 years ago), was decisive for the development of human mental and cognitive abilities. It was also the time when people acquired seafaring skills and detachments of colonists could make transitions up to 180 km. Regular maritime navigation, obviously, required the improvement of the communication system, that is, the language.

People of this era also mined ocher and flint in several world regions. They began to build large joint houses out of bones and put up stone walls inside the caves. And most importantly, they created art. In Australia, some samples of rock art appeared 60,000 years ago, that is, in the era of the settlement of the continent by people. In hundreds of places there are objects that are believed to be of more ancient origin than the art of Western Europe. But during this era, rock art also appears in Europe. Its oldest example of those that are known to us - a system of nineteen cup-like signs in a cave in France, carved on a stone rock slab, covered the place of a child's burial.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this era is the cultural unanimity that prevailed in the then world in all regions of settlement. Despite the differences in tools, no doubt due to differences in environment, cultural behavior was surprisingly stable. The use of ocher and an expressively monotonous set of geometric marks testify to the existence of a universal artistic language between archaic Homo sapiens, including European Neanderthals and others we know about from fossils.

Figured images (sculptures) arranged in a circle first appear in Israel (about 250-300 thousand years ago), in the form of modified natural forms, then in Siberia and central Europe(about 30-35 thousand years ago), and only then in Western Europe. About 30,000 years ago, rock art was enriched by intricate finger-cuts on the soft surface of caves in Australia and Europe, and stencil images of palms in France. Two-dimensional images of objects began to appear. The oldest samples, created approximately 32,000 years ago, come from France, followed by South African drawings (Namibia).

About 20,000 years ago (very recently in terms of human history), significant differences begin to form between cultures. Late Paleolithic people in Western Europe began a graceful tradition, both in sculptural and graphic arts ritual and decorative use. About 15,000 years ago, this tradition led to the emergence of such famous masterpieces, as painting in the caves of Altamira (Spain) and Lesko (France), as well as the appearance of thousands of skillfully carved figures from stone, tusks, bone, clay and other materials. It was a time of the finest multicolored works of cave art, drawn or minted by a certain hand of master craftsmen. However, the development of graphic traditions in other regions was not easy.

In Asia the forms of geometrical art developed into very perfect systems, some resembling official records, others mnemonic emblems, peculiar texts intended to refresh the memory.

Starting around the end of the ice age, about 10,000 years ago, rock art has gradually moved beyond the caves. It was not dictated by the search for new the best places how (there is almost no doubt here) the survival of rock art through selection. Rock art is well preserved in the permanent conditions of deep limestone caves, but not on rock surfaces more open to destruction. So, the unquestioning spread of rock art at the end of the Ice Age does not indicate the growth of artistic production, but the overcoming of the threshold of what ensured good preservation.

On all continents, bypassing Antarctica, rock art now shows the diversity of artistic styles and cultures, the progressive growth of the ethnic diversity of mankind on all continents, as well as the development of major religions. Even the last historical stage the development of mass migrations, colonizations and religious expansion - thoroughly reflected in rock art.

DATING

There are two main forms of rock art, petroglyphs (carvings) and pictors (drawings). Petroglyphic motifs were created by carving, gouging, chasing or polishing rock surfaces. In pictograms, additional substances, usually paint, were superimposed on the rocky surface. This difference is very important, it determines the approaches to dating.

The methodology of scientific dating of rock art has been developed only during the last fifteen years. Therefore, it is still at the stage of its "childhood", and the dating of almost all world rock art remains in poor condition. This, however, does not mean that we have no idea of ​​his age: often there are all kinds of landmarks that allow us to determine the approximate or at least probable age. Sometimes it is lucky to determine the age of a rock carving quite accurately, especially when the paint contains organic substances or microscopic inclusions that allow dating due to the radioactive isotope of carbon they contain. A careful evaluation of the results of such an analysis can determine the date quite accurately. On the other hand, the dating of petroglyphs remains extremely difficult.

Modern methods are based on determining the age of mineral deposits that could be deposited on rock art. But they allow you to determine only the minimum age. One way is to analyze the microscopic organic matter interspersed in such mineral layers; laser technology can be successfully used here. Today, only one method is suitable for determining the age of the petroglyphs themselves. It is based on the fact that the mineral crystals, which were chipped during the gouging of petroglyphs, initially had sharp edges, which eventually became blunt and rounded. By determining the rate of such processes on nearby surfaces, the age of which is known, it is possible to calculate the age of petroglyphs.

Several archaeological methods can also help a little in the matter of dating. If, for example, a rock surface is covered with archaeological layers of mud whose age can be determined, they can be used to determine the minimum age of petroglyphs. Style comparisons are often made to determine chronological framework rock art, however, not very successful.

Much more reliable methods of studying rock art, which often resemble the methods of forensic science. For example, the ingredients of a paint can tell how it was made, what tools and additives were used, where the dyes came from, and the like. Human blood, which was used as a binder in glacial period, found in Australian rock art. The Australian researchers also found up to forty layers of paint superimposed on each other in different places, indicating the constant redrawing of the same surface over a long time. Like the pages of a book, these layers tell us the history of the use of surfaces by artists over generations. The study of such layers is just beginning and can lead to a real revolution in views.

The pollen of plants found on the fibers of brushes in the paint of rock paintings indicates what crops were grown by contemporaries of ancient artists. In some French caves, characteristic paint recipes were found out by their chemical composition. By charcoal dyes, often used for drawings, even the type of wood burned to charcoal was determined.

Rock art research has evolved into a separate scientific discipline, and is already used by many other disciplines, from geology to semiotics, from ethnology to cybernetics. His methodology provides for expressiveness through the electronic display of colors of very spoiled, almost completely faded drawings; a wide range of specialized description methods; microscopic studies of traces left by tools and scanty sediments.

VULNERABLE MONUMENTS

Methods for the preservation of prehistoric monuments are also being developed and increasingly applied. Copies of rock art pieces (fragments of the object or even the entire object) have been made to prevent damage to the originals. Yet many of the world's prehistoric monuments are in constant danger. Acid rain dissolves the protective mineral layers that cover many petroglyphs. All stormy streams tourists, urban sprawl, industrial and mountain development, even unqualified studies contribute to the dirty work of shortening the age of invaluable artistic treasures.

October 13, 2014, 13:31

Rock paintings in Horseshoe Canyon, Utah, USA.

Similar ancient historical monuments not concentrated somewhere in one place, but scattered throughout the planet. Petroglyphs were not found at the same time, sometimes discoveries various drawings separated by significant time intervals.

At times, on the same rocks, scientists find drawings from different millennia. There are traces of similarities between various rock paintings, so that it seems that in ancient times there was a single pra-culture and universal knowledge associated with it. So, many figures in the drawings have the same features, although their authors did not know anything about each other - they were separated by a huge distance and time. However, the similarity in the images is systematic: in particular, the heads of the gods always radiate light. Despite the fact that the rock paintings have been studied for about 200 years, they still remain a mystery.

It is believed that the first images of mysterious creatures were rock paintings on Mount Hunan, China (picture above). They are about 47,000 years old. These drawings supposedly depict early contacts with unknown beings, possibly visitors from extraterrestrial civilizations.

These drawings were found in national park called Sera da Capivara in Brazil. Experts say that the paintings were created about twenty-nine thousand years ago:

Interesting rock carvings over 10,000 years old were recently discovered in the state of Chhattisgarh, India:

This rock art dates back to around 10,000 BC and is located in Val Camonica, Italy. The painted figures look like two creatures wearing protective suits and their heads emitting light. In their hands they hold strange devices:

The next example is the rock carving of a luminous man, which is located 18 km west of the city of Navoi (Uzbekistan). At the same time, a radiant figure sits on a throne, and the figures standing near it have something similar to protective masks on their faces. The kneeling person in the lower part of the drawing does not have such a device - he is at a considerable distance from the luminous figure and, apparently, does not need such protection.

Tassilin Adjer (Plateau of Rivers) is the largest monument of rock art in the Sahara. The plateau is located in the southeastern part of Algeria. The most ancient petroglyphs of Tassilin-Adjer date back to the 7th millennium BC. And the latest - the 7th century AD. For the first time, drawings on the plateau were seen in 1909:

Depiction dated circa 600 BC, from Tassilin Adjer. In the figure, a creature with different eyes, a strange hairstyle "from the petals" and a shapeless figure. More than a hundred similar "gods" were found in the caves:

These frescoes, found in the Sahara desert, depict a humanoid creature in a space suit. Frescoes - 5 thousand years:

Australia is isolated from other continents. However, on the Kimberley Plateau (northwest Australia) there are entire galleries of petroglyphs. And here all the same motifs are present: gods with similar faces and with a halo of rays around their heads. The drawings were first discovered in 1891:

These are images of Vandina, the goddess of the sky, in a halo of shining rays.

Rock art in Puerta del Canyon, Argentina:

Sego Canyon, Utah, USA. The most ancient petroglyphs appeared here more than 8,000 years ago:

"Rock-newspaper" in the same place, in Utah:

"Alien", Arizona, USA:

California, USA:

An image of an "alien". Kalbak-Tash, Altai, Russia:

"Sun Man" from the Karakol Valley, Altai:

Another of the many petroglyphs of the Italian Val Camonica valley in the Southern Alps:

Rock paintings of Gobustan, Azerbaijan. Scientists date the most ancient drawings to the Mesolithic era (about 10 thousand years ago:

Ancient rock paintings in Niger:

Onega petroglyphs at Cape Besov Nos, Russia. The most famous of the Onega petroglyphs is Bes, its length is two and a half meters. The image is crossed by a deep crack, dividing it exactly into two halves. A “gap” into another, otherworldly world. Satellite navigation often fails within a kilometer radius from Bes. The clock also behaves unpredictably: it can run forward, it can stop. What is the reason for such an anomaly, scientists only speculate. Ancient figure cut Orthodox cross. Most likely, it was hollowed out over the demonic image by the monks of the Murom Monastery in the 15th-16th centuries. In order to neutralize the devil's power:

Petroglyphs of Tamgaly, Kazakhstan. Rock paintings abound in a variety of subjects, and the most common of them depict divine sun-headed creatures:

White Shaman Rock in Lower Canyon, Texas. The age of this seven-meter image, according to experts, is more than four thousand years. It is believed that the White Shaman hides the secrets of an ancient vanished cult:

Rock carvings of giant people from South Africa:

Mexico. Veracruz, Las Palmas: cave paintings depicting creatures in spacesuits:

Rock paintings in the Pegtymel river valley, Chukotka, Russia:

The twin gods fight with battle axes. One of the petroglyphs found in Tanumshead, western Sweden (drawings painted in red already in the modern period):

Among the petroglyphs on the Litsleby rock massif, a giant (2.3 m tall) image of a god with a spear (possibly Odin) dominates:

Sarmysh-say gorge, Uzbekistan. Numerous ancient rock carvings of people in strange clothes were found in the gorge, some of which can be interpreted as images of "ancient astronauts":

Rock paintings of the Hopi Indians in Arizona, USA, depicting certain creatures - kachina. The Hopi considered these mysterious kachinas to be their celestial teachers:

In addition, there are many ancient rock carvings, either solar symbols, or some objects resembling aircraft.

Cave paintings in San Antonio, Texas, USA.

This ancient rock art, discovered in Australia, depicts something very similar to a space alien ship. At the same time, the image may well mean something quite understandable.

Something like a rocket taking off. Kalbysh Tash, Altai.

Petroglyph depicting a UFO. Bolivia.

UFO from a cave in Chhattisgarh, India

The petroglyphs of Lake Onega depict cosmic, solar and moon signs: circles and semicircles with outgoing lines-rays, in which modern man will clearly see both the radar and the spacesuit. Moreover, TV.

Rock art, Arizona, USA

Petroglyphs of Panama

California, USA

Guanche rock paintings, Canary Islands

ancient images mystical symbol spirals are found everywhere in the world. These rock paintings were once created by Indians in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, USA.

Rock art, Nevada, USA

One of the drawings discovered in a cave on the island of Youth, off the coast of Cuba. It bears a strong resemblance to the structure solar system, where there is an image of eight planets with their largest satellites.

These petroglyphs are located in Pakistan, in the Indus Valley:

Once in these places there was a highly developed Indian civilization. It was from her that these ancient images carved on stones remained. Take a closer look - don't you think that these are mysterious vimanas - flying chariots from ancient Indian myths?

September 12, 1940 Four French teenagers accidentally stumble upon a narrow hole formed after a fall of a pine tree, which was struck by lightning. They decided that this was the exit from the underground passage leading to the nearby ruins of the castle, and hoped to find a treasure there. But when they got inside and saw huge drawings on the walls, they realized that this was not just an underground passage, and they reported their find to the teacher. This is how the Lascaux cave was discovered.

All the walls of the cave were completely covered with amazing drawings of animals - bulls, bison, rhinos, horses, deer, even a unicorn, painted with ocher, soot and marl (rock, like clay) and circled in dark contours. Some of the drawings were V life size !
Scientist A. Breil spent several months in this cave, making all kinds of measurements and studying primitive painting. At first, art historians doubted the authenticity of the drawings, but a thorough examination rejected all suspicions of forgery, and the age of the images was estimated at 15,000 years.

Very soon, many tourists began to come to the Lasko cave, and soon scientists noticed that the drawings were slowly beginning to collapse. This was due to the excess carbon dioxide exhaled by the people who visited the caves. Soon, tourists were no longer allowed into the Lasko cave and it was mothballed, and a copy of it, Lasko II, was created next to it. It is a concrete structure, inside of which the petroglyphs of selected parts of Lascaux were faithfully reproduced.

Osya and I really liked that on the official website you can make virtual journey through the cave. In some places you can stop, zoom in on the drawing, examine it and read about it. small text(There is no Russian language on the site, but there is English). Here is the site: http://www.lascaux.culture.fr/#/en/02_00.xml

The figures of animals are drawn mainly in profile, in motion. Interestingly, when several animals accumulate in one scene at once, different sizes And different colors, and at the same time drawn so that one figure is superimposed on another, then a cartoon feeling is created if you move the window on the site. Probably, the same effect will be if you move next to these drawings with a lantern in your hands, it's a pity that we can't check :)

There is only one image of a man on the walls of the cave: here you can see four figures combined into one compositional space - a bison pierced by a spear, a lying man, a small bird and a fuzzy silhouette of a receding rhinoceros. The bison stands in profile, but his head is turned towards the viewer. The man is depicted schematically, as in children's drawings. Everything is drawn with a thick black line and not filled with color. Scientists are still arguing what exactly is depicted in this picture: did the bison kill a man, and did the nasorok inflict a mortal wound on the bison? Or is it the other way around?

I showed Osa just such a picture and told that the paints were then mineral. The basis of black paint was manganese, and red - iron oxide. Pieces of minerals were ground into powder on stone slabs, or on animal bones, for example, on a bison shoulder blade. This colored powder was kept in hollowed out bones or leather pouches worn on the belt.

This picture shows an image of a huge bull. The figure of the right bull is the largest rock art in the world, its length is 5.2 meters.
To make it clearer what five meters is, we measured this distance in the apartment and figured out how huge the bull was.

Interestingly, in the Lascaux cave there is an image of a mythical animal - a unicorn:

But this big black bull, 3.71 meters long, is interesting in that it was painted with paint sprayed through a special tube:

What you can do if the child is interested in these drawings:

- you can take craft paper, wrinkle it properly (we didn’t guess right away, but when we came across a crumpled piece of wrapping paper, Osya himself noticed that it turns out to be more textured and the surface resembles the surface of a stone) and hang it on the wall to draw memorable ones on it figures in charcoal, sanguine or multi-colored pastels. And you can paint if the child does not want to get his hands dirty. Most importantly, do not forget to cover the floor around.

And can you do natural paints- from clay and berries, and paint animals with them. And then make a contour separately with charcoal.

You can also try painting with homemade brushes. Offer the child a small stick, some grass/flower stems, and some string. Will he guess what to do with them? And if you cut off a sponge for washing dishes upper layer, then you can play that this is the skin of an animal that ancient people used to paint over a large area of ​​​​the picture. Shall we try?

To draw drawings, you can simply sit on a table or on the floor, or you can imagine that we are in a cave and draw on its walls and vaults. Once, when we were playing primitive people, we pasted over the place under the table with paper, and Osya left the rock carvings lying on his back.

This time we hung the drawings under desk, then Osya blocked the entrance to the "cave" with cushions from the sofa, and we played as if we ourselves were walking and unexpectedly found such a treasure - a cave with ancient rock paintings. In the evening, when it was already dark, we turned off the light and climbed into the cave with lanterns and candles and looked at the images on the walls.

Rock art - images in caves, made by people of the Paleolithic era, one of the types of primitive art. Most of these objects were found in Europe, since it was there that ancient people were forced to live in caves and grottoes to escape the cold. But there are such caves in Asia, for example, Niah Caves in Malaysia.

Long years modern civilization had no idea about any objects ancient painting, however, in 1879, the Spanish amateur archaeologist Marcelino-Sans de Sautuola, along with his 9-year-old daughter, accidentally stumbled upon the Altamira cave, the vaults of which were decorated with many drawings of ancient people - an unparalleled find that shocked the researcher and inspired him for her close study. A year later, Sautuola, together with his friend Juan Vilanov y Pier from the University of Madrid, published their research results, which dated the execution of the drawings to the Paleolithic era. Many scientists took this message extremely ambiguously, Sautuola was accused of falsifying the finds, but later similar caves were discovered in many other parts of the world.

Rock art has been an object of great interest from the scientists of the world since its discovery in the 19th century. The first finds were made in Spain, but subsequently the rock paintings were discovered in different corners world, from Europe and Africa to Malaysia and Australia, as well as in North and South America.

Rock paintings are a source of valuable information for many scientific disciplines associated with the study of antiquity - from anthropology to zoology.

It is customary to distinguish between single-color, or monochrome, and multi-color, or polychrome images. Developing over time, by the XII millennium BC. e. cave painting began to be performed taking into account the volume, perspective, color and proportion of figures, took into account movement. Later cave painting became more stylized.

To create drawings, dyes of various origins were used: mineral (hematite, clay, manganese oxide), animal, vegetable ( charcoal). Dyes were mixed with binders, such as tree resin or animal fat, if necessary, and applied directly to the surface with the fingers; tools were also used, such as hollow tubes through which dyes were applied, as well as reeds and primitive brushes. Sometimes, to achieve greater clarity of contours, scraping or cutting out the contours of figures on the walls was used.

Since almost no sunlight penetrates into the caves in which most of the rock paintings are located, torches and primitive lamps were used to create the paintings for lighting.

Cave painting of the Paleolithic era consisted of lines and was dedicated mainly to animals. Over time, cave painting evolved as primitive communities developed; in the painting of the Mesolithic and Neolithic eras, there are both animals and handprints and images of people, their interactions with animals and with each other, as well as deities of primitive cults, their rites. A notable proportion of Neolithic drawings are images of ungulates, such as bison, deer, elk and horses, as well as mammoths; handprints also make up a large proportion. Animals were often depicted as wounded, with arrows sticking out of them. Later rock paintings also depict domesticated animals and other subjects contemporary to the authors. Known images of the ships of the sailors of ancient Phenicia, seen by the more primitive communities of the Iberian Peninsula.

Cave painting was widely practiced by primitive hunter-gatherer societies who found shelter in or near caves. The way of life of primitive people has changed little over the millennia, in connection with which both dyes and the plots of rock paintings remained practically unchanged and were common to populations of people who lived thousands of kilometers from each other.

However, there are differences between cave paintings of different time periods and regions. Thus, in the caves of Europe, animals are mainly depicted, while African rock paintings pay equal attention to both man and fauna. The technique of creating drawings also underwent certain changes; more late painting is often less rough and shows more high level cultural development.