Archaeologists document 280 Paleolithic engravings in Catalonia's Font Major cave

A cave visitors had passed for decades

The Cova de la Font Major in L'Espluga de Francolí, Tarragona, has been open to visitors since 1957 and became a tourist attraction in 1993. Researchers from the Iphes-Cerca institute and the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) have documented 280 graphic motifs on its walls in a study published in the journal Antiquity, which the Iphes announced on Thursday, 5 November. The engravings were first identified in October 2019 during an archaeological campaign, shortly after a flood of the Francolí river had badly hit the area. Researchers say thousands of visitors walked past the carved surfaces for more than six decades, and some scratched their own names and dates over them.

What the carvings show

The engravings concentrate in the Gatoneres de Cal Palletes, a set of galleries about 250 metres from the cave entrance. The figures sit mainly on walls and ceilings, especially in softer and therefore more fragile stretches of rock. The collection includes 55 animal figures, among them horses, deer, bovids and caprines, plus a bear drawn with its ears in frontal perspective, an animal rarely seen in Paleolithic art. Researchers also recorded geometric forms, parallel lines and a distinctive composition of hundreds of loop-shaped incisions. Josep Maria Vergès, a co-author of the study, described how the carvings went unrecognised for so long.

“For more than six decades, thousands of visitors passed directly in front of the engraved surfaces”

Engravings identified280

Animal figures55

Engravings identified

280 count

Animal figures

55 count

Data from the article text

Why the art went unnoticed

Before this discovery, only two Paleolithic images had been documented in all of Catalonia, and researchers had believed the cave's conglomerate walls were unsuitable for prehistoric engraving. Míriam Salas-Altès, who co-leads the work, ties the delay to conditions inside the cave. The carvings lie in dark underground passages, where even a headlamp does not always make them easy to recognise. Graffiti covers many of the walls, and some visitors cut over older engravings, damaging or obscuring part of the original art. Researchers believe the original number of images was probably higher than the 280 identified today.

Age and open questions

The exact age of the engravings is still uncertain. Accounts differ, with one report saying researchers suspect much of the art is more than 19,000 years old and another putting it at more than 20,000 years. The meaning of the abstract signs also remains unknown, according to the researchers cited by El Periódico. The Antiquity paper is presented as the first full analysis of the 280 engravings, and its authors argue the find shows a Mediterranean artistic tradition distinct from the Franco-Cantabrian one. The study ranks the cave third among Mediterranean-facing Paleolithic art sites in the Iberian Peninsula, behind Ardales and La Pileta in Andalusia.