Gouy Cave

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CONTENTS

• Summary
• Most Northerly Cave Art in France
• Discovery & Excavation
• Layout
• Cave Art
• Highlights
• Abstract Signs
• References

Summary

Gouy Cave (Grotte de Gouy) in Normandy, France, one of the northernmost paleolithic caves on the Continent, is noted for its rock engravings dating to Magdalenian culture (about 12,000 BC), and for its triangle signs evoking female genitalia.

Most Northerly Cave Art in France

Until recently, Gouy was thought to contain the most northerly paleolithic parietal art in Western Europe.

However, during the 2000s, this title was assumed by the engraving of a stag (12,000 BC), which was found 500 miles further north, at Creswell Crags, England.

The discoveries of prehistoric art at Gouy and Creswell Crags - and at Cathole Cave in Wales - have attracted some scepticism, due to their proximity to the southern edge of the ice sheet, during the Last Glacial Maximum.

However, the carvings in the UK have been dated using modern dating methods, (U/Th dating), and indirectly corroborate the antiquity of the rock art at Gouy.

What's more, Gouy is only 30 kms north of Métreville, whose rock shelters have been known for their Magdalenian mammoth bone tools, since 1905.

The revelation that hunter-gatherer art was created next door to the ice sheet, extends the likely distribution of such works further to the north. We should therefore expect similar discoveries in Belgium and Germany.

What is more curious, is the fact that the Grande Grotte at Arcy-sur-Cure - 300 kilometres to the southeast in Burgundy, is the second most northerly decorated cave in France. Why the huge gap?

Discovery & Excavation

Grotte de Gouy was discovered in 1956 by two boys, although inscriptions were found which implied the cave had been found (but not reported) by two locals (Narcisse Reboursier and Jamelin), in 1881.

The negative reception given to the parietal art found at Altamira two years earlier, may have been the cause of their silence.

Excavations began at Gouy in 1959, supervised by the director of the Circonscription des Antiquites Prehistoriques, M. J. Graindor.

This followed the authentication of the engravings in 1958, by the renowned archaeologist Abbé Breuil (1877-1961).

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Stratigraphy

The stratigraphy of the site comprises a total deposit of less than a metre, laid out in five layers from bottom to top, as follows:

• Less than 30 cms of sterile rubble made up of limestone rock
• 30 cms of chalky, yellow, limestone sand
• 3 cms of packed limestone sand
• 3 cms of chalk powder intermingled with limestone blocks
• 30 cms of limestone blocks dating to the modern period

Layout

Gouy is hollowed out of white chalk, embedded with thin seams of flint rock as well as flint nodules that protrude from the walls.

It is an extremely small cave which resembles a narrow corridor.

It measures roughly 12 metres in length and 2 metres in width (at the entrance) and gradually narrows towards the back, where it forms an inaccessible crack in the rock.

The cave has three small chambers.

• The first chamber (about 4 metres long and 2 metres wide), the largest chamber in the cave, has suffered major erosion since the Paleolithic era. Although numerous images can still be seen, many others have been lost.
• The second chamber (2 metres long and 1.5 metres wide), is smaller and more ovular, with a dome-like ceiling.
• The third chamber (4 metres long and 50 centimetres wide) is even narrower.

Cave Art

Gouy's cave art appears on two different registers: lower and upper.

• The lower register contains engravings that are both strongly incised and highly visible. The animal figures here, tend to be more naturalistic in style, although their insides are often filled with a series of linear markings.
• In total, there are about 60 clusters of linear engravings, including signs as well as animal figures - mainly aurochs, horses and one bird. In addition, there are multiple images of female genitalia and several triangle signs.
• The upper register contains very lightly incised engravings, many of which are hardly visible. The figures are more stylized, and many are infilled with dense arrangements of criss-cross patterns and triangular signs.
• The first chamber alone contains over one hundred clusters of engraved lines, including abstract or geometric signs as well as small figurative subjects.

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Highlights

• The Small Horse
  Located in the upper register of the first chamber, this is the only complete depiction of this animal in the cave, even though its wall support is crumbling.
• The Stampede
  In the same location is a deeply incised engraving of six animals (horses and aurochs), five of which are represented by their heads only, although their bodies are suggested by a series of lines. The artist successfully creates the impression of a rushing herd. The composition remains in good condition due to its position in a protected alcove.
• Head of an Aurochs
  On the upper register of the first chamber is an engraved drawing of a young aurochs, which is completely filled with crosshatch patterns.
• Horse with Lines
  The highlight of the third chamber is the drawing of a horse on the left wall. The contour line of its neck and chest, is replicated several times on the inside of its body, by way of numerous curved but parallel lines. The head is also full of lines. The front and hind legs are not defined. The figure is similar to equine engravings found at La Griega Cave at Segovia, Spain, and Escoural Cave, near Alto da Abaneja in Portugal.
• Triangles
  Dozens of triangular signs found on animal images. These, along with similar signs found incised onto horses' teeth, may be representations of female vulvas.

Overall, Gouy's walls (at least in parts) give the appearance of a tangled mess of diagonal and parallel lines, crossed by occasional figurative shapes, as well as numerous undefined shapes, signs and figures.

There are so many lines and doodle-type shapes, it looks like the artists were fixated on covering as much of the lower wall area as possible.

Abstract Signs

Abstract signs and symbols are a ubiquitous feature of caves during the Stone Age, and Gouy Cave is no exception. It contains several of the basic signs used during the Upper Paleolithic.

They include:

• Circle signs (geometric)
• Claviforms (key-shaped)
• Flabelliforms (fan-shaped)
• Line signs (linear)
• Open-angle (horizonal V signs)
• Oval signs (geometric)
• Penniforms (feather-shaped)
• Serpentiforms (snake-like)

Paleoanthropologists know next to nothing about the meaning of these signs, except that they probably serve as pictographs that convey information.

References

(1) 'Palaeolithic Decorated Cave In Normandy.' fossilhunters.xyz
(2) Graindor, M.-J. (1972). "Upper Palaeolithic Rock Engravings at Gouy (France)". World Archaeology. 3 (3): 243–251.
(3) Martin, Yves, 'The Engravings of Gouy: France’s Northernmost Decorated Cave', in Paul Pettitt, and others (eds), Palaeolithic Cave Art at Creswell Crags in European Context (Oxford, 2007) Print ISBN: 9780199299171