Neanderthals build stalagmite ring structures deep in Bruniquel Cave
- Date
- c. 176,500 years ago
- Category
- Culture, arts & philosophy
- Region
- Europe (France)
- Era
- Prehistory
- Significance
About 336 metres inside Bruniquel Cave in southwestern France, far beyond the reach of natural daylight, lies an extraordinary set of constructions: roughly 400 broken stalagmite segments deliberately arranged into two large rings and several smaller piles, with traces of fire on many pieces.
Uranium-series dating of the calcite that later grew over the broken stalagmites places the construction at around 176,500 years ago. At that date the only humans in the region were early Neanderthals, making them the unambiguous builders. Reaching and working in this deep, pitch-black chamber required artificial lighting (fire), coordination among several individuals, and a willingness to venture into a hazardous underground environment for non-utilitarian purposes. The structures are among the oldest known constructions made by any hominin and push evidence for organised, possibly symbolic, Neanderthal behaviour back well before the arrival of modern humans in Europe. Their exact purpose remains unknown, but the find decisively overturned the assumption that complex spatial organisation and the mastery of deep caves were unique to Homo sapiens.
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Further reading
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