Cave paintings in Spain originate from Neanderthals

Studies of pigments from wall paintings in Cueva Ardales, a cave in southern Spain, have confirmed the assumption that they originated from Neanderthals / Publication in PNAS. The dating of paintings in three caves in Spain supports the view that Neanderthals practiced cave art in the form of colored markings more than 20,000 years before the arrival of anatomically modern humans in Europe. Àfrica Pitarch Martí and her colleagues from Collaborative Research Center 806 "Our Way to Europe" conducted geoscientific analyses on red pigments from a massive stalagmitic pillar in Cueva de Ardales. The objective was to characterize the composition and possible origin of the pigments. The results showed that the composition and arrangement of the pigments cannot be attributed to natural processes, but that they were applied by spraying and in some places by blowing. The study, "The symbolic role of the underground world among Middle Palaeolithic Neanderthals," has now been published in PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America). The nature of the pigments does not match natural samples taken from the floor and walls of the cave, suggesting that the pigments were brought into the cave from outside.