ABSTRACT
Avisit to Lascaux Cave in southwestern France begins with a descent into inky blackness. Visitors, limited to a small number in order to preserve the cave, are asked to dip their feet into a pan filled with disinfectant and are then ushered through a door into a chamber shrouded in darkness, where they wait until the guide is ready. A switch is thrown, and in the dazzle of newly erupting light, all eyes are drawn upward to gaze in awe at scenes of massive bulls painted onto the cave walls 15,000 years ago. The wonder of Lascaux Cave is so powerful that it stuns even the most jaded (see Figure 5.1). One feels an instinctive connection to the people who shared our drive to represent the world-to make art of our experience. How did humanity move from the age of Homo erectus and Neanderthals to the explosion of creativity found on the walls of Lascaux Cave? This question has both inspired and vexed archaeologists for close to a century as they have struggled to understand the origin of modern humans and the fate of Neanderthals.
