In 1940, A Dog Investigated A Hole In A Tree And Discovered A Vast Cave Filled With Ancient Human Artwork

On September 12, 1940, a dog in France made one of the most exciting archaeological discoveries of the 20th century.

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Marcel Ravidat, an 18-year-old student, was exploring the woods in Montignac in Dordogne, southern France, when his dog named Robot began investigating a small hole next to an uprooted tree. According to some retellings of the tale, the dog was chasing after a rabbit when it made what turned out to be quite an important discovery. 

Ravidat was aware of a local legend that there was a secret underground tunnel somewhere in the hill, which would lead to a local mansion: Lascaux Manor. In other versions of the legend, which is likely merely a myth, the tunnel would lead to a grotto filled with treasure. Either way, he tried to investigate the tunnel alone that day, before abandoning the attempt due to a lack of tools for the job.

A few days later he returned with three friends from his village – Jacques Marsal, Georges Agnel, and Simon Coencas – and the four of them enlarged the hole until it was big enough for them to fit through. Ravidat crawled into the hole first, before his three companions joined him shortly afterwards, finding themselves not in a secret passageway, but a cave that had not been opened in thousands of years.

"By the light of a hastily constructed lamp, they walked along a gallery some thirty metres long. As the passageway narrowed, they spied the first paintings in what is now known as the Axial Gallery," the National Archaeological Museum in France explains. "They explored every part of the cave, whose walls were covered in a fabulous bestiary, finally coming to halt before a black hole that led downwards to other parts of the cave."

Though they did not know it yet, they had discovered some truly ancient artwork, created by prehistoric humans approximately 17-22,000 years in our past. The next day, the young men returned to explore that second passageway with a rope, lowering Ravidat down the 8-meter (26-foot) shaft. It was here that the boys found the centerpiece of Lascaux cave – a large painting of a bison, made by the light of a fire, or lamps fueled with animal fat.

The teenagers, though they knew the cave to be an impressive find, still did not know exactly what they were looking at. They let others know of the cave, charging a little for visits to see the cave drawings. They then contacted their schoolteacher, Leon Laval, whom they knew to be interested in history. 

Laval was a member of a local prehistoric society, and though he was skeptical at first of Ravidat's claims, once he saw the paintings he recognized them to be of ancient origin, contacting appropriate archaeologists for further investigation. Laval advised the students to make sure that nobody touched the paintings in the meantime, and Ravidat set up a tent outside the entranceway in order to protect it from unwanted visitors.

There are close to 600 drawings within Lascaux, of animals including deer, horses (the most numerous in the cave), bison, and cats, among others. The cave itself is not thought to have been occupied, other than temporarily by the prehistoric artists who created their work by firelight. The colors seen in the paintings were created with red clay and ocher, yellow iron oxyhydroxides, and black charcoal and manganese oxides.

It is not known exactly the purpose of the paintings and engravings, thought to be from the early Magdalenian cultures.

"[I]mages of animals are superimposed on top of earlier depictions, which suggests that the motivation for the paintings may have been in the act of portraying the animals rather than in the artistic effect of the final composition," The Met explains. "Most of the paintings are located at a distance from the cave’s entrance, and many of the chambers are not easily accessible. This placement, together with the enormous size and compelling grandeur of the paintings, suggests that the remote chambers may have served as sacred or ceremonial meeting places."

"Some people think the cave paintings weren’t just for fun or decoration," Frances Fowle, Personal Chair of Nineteenth-Century Art, History of Art at the University of Edinburgh explains in a piece for The Conversation, adding that they were possibly ritualistic in nature. "By drawing animals like deer or bison, they argue, the person who made the picture (maybe a hunter) thought it would give them 'magical' power over the animal they were hoping to catch."

The cave was opened to the public in 1948, but closed in 1963 after fungus was discovered on the walls. Since then, there have been several faithful replicas created, with one open to the public not far from the original.