Map of Cave Painting Sites

  • Key Dates

  • Map of Cave Painting Sites

    • Key Dates
    • Upper Paleolithic
      (c. 50,000/45,000-c. 8,000 BCE)
    • Mesolithic
      (c. 8000- 4000 BCE)
    • Neolithic
      (c. 8000 - 2300 BCE)
    • Bronze Age
      (c. 2300 - 1000 BCE)

    “There is tragic evidence to show that the paintings at the French prehistoric art sites are deteriorating.”
                          - Louis Leakey

  • Mesolithic
    (c. 8000- 4000 BCE)
  • Neolithic
    (c. 8000 - 2300 BCE)
  • Bronze Age
    (c. 2300 - 1000 BCE)
  • .

“There is tragic evidence to show that the paintings at the French prehistoric art sites are deteriorating.”
                         - Louis Leakey

Mammoth bone houses
From Ukraine, Russia
From Ukraine, Russia


Mammoth bone house.
Ukraine, Russia
c 16,000 - 10,000 B.C.E.
Photo© LaCour Slide Library
Stokstad- Art History Set

  • well preserved
  • solid, weatherproof shelter in treeless grasslands
  • settlements up to 10 houses
  • bones of wooly mammoth (extinct elephant)
  • best preserved site MEZHIRICH, Ukraine
  • c 16,000 - 10,000 BCE
  • from 13’ - 26’ diameter
  • largest 24’ x 33’
    skulls, shoulder blades
    pelvis bones, tusks
    curving tusks made excellent roof supports
  • arched door openings
    bone framework
  • probably covered with animal hides and turf
  • Inside =15 small hearths
  • still with ashes & charred bones