Overview
- Researchers first recognized the Paleolithic engravings during a 2019 excavation of Cova de la Font Major and have published a formal study in Antiquity this week documenting 280 motifs.
- The ensemble includes about 55 animal figures such as horses, deer, bovids and a rare bear along with parallel lines and an unusual panel of looped marks.
- Decades of public visitation and modern graffiti obscured and in some cases damaged the shallow engravings, prompting managers to restrict access to the decorated gallery to protect fragile surfaces.
- Stylistic and contextual evidence links much of the art to the Upper Paleolithic with a likely age of at least ~19,000 years, but researchers are pursuing direct dating methods such as uranium-series on calcite overgrowths to secure firm ages.
- The find challenges the idea that northeastern Iberia lacked Paleolithic parietal art, highlights how lighting, wall geology and past tourism can hide sites, and suggests sealed or sediment-filled passages may hold further engravings.