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\n\tFor the first time, scientists have precisely dated prehistoric paintings inside Font-de-Gaume, a decorated cave in Dordogne, southwestern France. The news was reported by Science Daily, following an announcement made March 9 by France\u2019s National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS)<\/p>\n
\n\tDordogne\u2019s V\u00e9z\u00e8re Valley, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979, is famous for its prehistoric art, which includes the paintings at Font-de-Gaume as well as those at nearby Lascaux. Accurately determining the age of the paintings, however, has historically proved difficult.<\/p>\n
\n\tThis is because researchers had long assumed that the black pigments used by the paintings\u2019 makers were purely mineral, making radiocarbon dating\u2014a method that measures the amount of carbon-14 in organic materials\u2014impossible. Yet scientists had never confirmed that the pigments contained no carbon at all.<\/p>\n
\n\tTo investigate, a team of specialists led by a CNRS researcher first used non-invasive Raman microspectrometry and hyperspectral imaging to determine the chemical composition of black drawings at Font-de-Gaume. Both methods showed traces of carbon-containing charcoal in a significant number of figures.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe researchers were then allowed, as a special case, to take microsamples of pigment from two black drawings\u2014one of a bison and one of a human or animal face\u2014for radiocarbon dating. The results showed that the bison was painted about 13,000 years ago, while different sections of the mask were created during different periods, some separated by thousands of years.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe team\u2019s work has not only opened the door to more accurate dating of Paleolithic cave art in the region, it may also help researchers trace the evolution of artistic styles and whether people returned to individual caves and images over many generations.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/cave-painting-at-font-de-gaume.webp?w=1024″] For the first time, scientists have precisely dated prehistoric paintings inside Font-de-Gaume, a decorated cave in Dordogne, southwestern France. The news was reported by Science Daily, following an announcement made March 9 by France\u2019s National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) Dordogne\u2019s V\u00e9z\u00e8re Valley, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1979, is famous […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-2068212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2068212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2068212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2068212\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2068212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2068212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2068212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}