Altamira: A Chance to Reconsider the Past

How old is old?

The 2000 year old Aqueduct of Segovia

I drove through my town in Ohio last weekend with out-of-town guests and was proud to show off a building constructed (at least the original foundation) almost 180 years ago. That’s pretty impressive by post-colonial American standards! I believe that this fascination with our past is one thing that inspires us to travel. We want to connect with the past, and Europe is a comfortable place to do that. As I travel through Spain, I am in awe of the structures that remain in place 1000 years, even 2000 years since they were originally erected. I feel a sense of connection with these Iberians because people wrote about them. We know who they were (in a general sense), where they came from, and what inspired them.

Artist's rendering of an Upper Paleolithic Iberian

Most of us can conceptualize our existence in an “historical context”. History is often defined as the human story since the development of writing systems. Most historians agree that the first definite writing systems emerged in about 3200 BCE. So most of us have some familiarity with our human story since that time. Prior to that point, however, putting ourselves in perspective can be less certain and more daunting. Now, rather dealing with about 5200 years, we are dealing with almost 200,000 years (the point at which Homo Sapiens became dominant).

Connecting with those that came before is more conceptually challenging for us not just because of the scale of time, but also because they did not leave as many clues. That being said, just like early Native Americans, we can connect with them in ways that often take us beyond architecture or the written word. We can connect through art. 

Altamira marked in yellow

The Iberian Peninsula (Spain specifically) contains the oldest known cave paintings in Europe. These paintings are at least 40,000 years old, and maybe as old as 70,000 years. Experts disagree. This period, down through about 10,000 BCE is known as the Upper Paleolithic (Late Stone Age) period. The crown jewel of Paleolithic Iberian Art is the Altamira cave complex near the village of Santillana del Mar in the region of Cantabria.

The cave complex at Altamira is world-renowned for its remarkable etchings and paintings, especially of now-extinct bison. There are several things that make it special, even when compared to other similar sites. 

First is the polychromatic (multicolored) nature of the paintings. The rich colors of the original art were preserved when a landslide covered the entrance to the cave in about 12,000 BCE. When the cave was re-discovered in the 19th Century, most specialists believed that the images were forged because Stone Age artists could not have been sophisticated enough to create such complex drawings and engravings. Of course, they have now been proven as authentic. See the layers of colors and perspectives in the image below.

A second reason that these caves are so special is that we know (through modern dating techniques) that these paintings were created over a period of 20,000 years. Think about that in modern terms. It's really hard to get your head around. The subjects are mainly animals, drawn with remarkable accuracy. There is also abstract art and symbols that still have not been interpreted. In any case, these artists communicated not only with one another but across so many generations with these paintings. (You are about 1300 generations away from the original Altamira artists in case you were curious.)

A final reason (for me at least) that this site is so special is that we can visit it so conveniently. Well, there is a caveat. Most tourists cannot visit the original cave. Instead, you can visit a meticulously re-created version. A new cave was constructed to reduce the human impact on the original paintings. While this may sound disappointing, it is in fact a wonderful opportunity. If I had not been told I was in a replica cave, I would not have known. I was not hurried, and I did not need to wear protective clothing, as I would have if I had visited the original cave several hundred meters away. This replica, along with the remarkable on-site museum allows visitors to connect very intimately with the environment. NOTE: If you feel compelled to visit the original cave, there is a daily lottery (not-available during Covid) that provides an opportunity for 4 or 5 guests to visit the original chamber. 

My visit to Altamira gave me a sense of peace. For the first time, I felt like I could extend my comfort zone in the context of the human story. 35,000 years did not have to be such an abstract concept. We will never know everything about these people (perhaps our ancestors), but we can connect with them through their art. And that’s something.