If you could be a “fly on the wall” anywhere and at any time in history, where and when would you choose?
I would like to watch the creation of the ‘Venus of Laussel’. Also known as “Femme a la corne” this is a female image carved into the limestone entrance of a rockshelter in Marquay, Dordogne, southwestern France. It was blasted from its place decades ago and is now in the Musee d’Aquitaine, Bordeaux. The bas relief is about one and a half feet high and is roughly 25,000 years old.
The image shows a woman with her left hand is over her stomach, and her right holding a ‘horn’. The ‘horn’ (for want of a better description) has 13 notches carved in it. A ‘Y’ is carved on her thigh. The woman was coloured with red ochre.
A cache of stone tools were excavated at the base of this image while other bas-reliefs were found inside the shelter.
I have sooo many questions regarding this cave, these images, these tools. Oh to be a fly on the wall!!
The Burren and Beyond 