2 4 S PREHISTORIC PETTICOATS 



however, very remarkable that little damage appears to 

 have been done by the population to the paintings, even 

 when they exist in shallow caves or on overhanging rocks. 

 No doubt weathering, and the oozing of moisture, and the 

 flaking caused by it, has destroyed most of the Pleistocene 

 paintings which once existed, and it is an ascertained fact 

 that some for instance, those of Altamira are breaking 

 to pieces owing to the opening-up and frequentation of 

 the caverns. 



It has been remarked that, although these paintings 

 belong to what is called the " reindeer epoch," yet in the 

 cave of Altamira there are no representations of reindeer, 

 but chiefly of bison and wild boar. It is also remarkable 

 that in the case of the painted rock shelters of Calapata 

 (Lower Aragon) and of Cogul (near Lerida, in Catalonia), 

 no reindeer are represented ; but on the former there are 

 very admirable drawings of the red deer, and on the latter 

 silhouettes of the bull, of the red deer, and the ibex. In 

 fact, no representations of reindeer have been observed on 

 cave walls or rock-shelters south of the Pyrenees. It is 

 possible that this may be due to the date of the Spanish 

 paintings being a good deal later than that of those French 

 cave-paintings which show reindeer, mammoth, and 

 rhinoceros. And we have to bear in mind that in the 

 North of Africa (Oran) engraved drawings on exposed 

 rocks are known, which are for good reasons attributed to 

 the Neolithic period ; that is to say, they are later than 

 the Reindeer epoch of the Palaeolithic period, whilst some 

 are even much later. 



In any case we have to remember that there are two 

 very different and possible explanations of the presence or 

 absence either of certain animals' bones or of representa- 

 tions of certain animals in one " decorated " cave and not 

 in another. The one explanation is that animals have 

 succeeded one another in time in Western Europe 



