Cave markings confirmed as Britain's oldest prehistoric art

Cave markings dismissed for years confirmed as Britain's oldest prehistoric art

Painted rock art discovered in a Welsh cave has been confirmed to be the oldest in Britain.

The series of 10 red horizontal stripes was first found on the wall of a side chamber of Bacon Hole cave in Gower, Swansea, in 1912, before being dismissed years later as a natural phenomenon.

But archaeologists have now used scientific advances to date the rock art to at least 17,100 years ago - also making it the oldest in north-western Europe.

Archaeologist and prehistoric art specialist George Nash said the art could have been used as a "communication system" but that its meaning was something "way beyond our comprehension".

According to Nash, at the time of the cave art what is now the Bristol Channel was a "rich fertile plateau" between Gower and the north Devon coast.

This would have served as an important feeding ground in the summer for animals such as mammoth, bison, horse, elk, and reindeer, and would have in turn drawn hunter gatherers toward the area.

It's thought they would have used some of the 95 caves along the Gower Peninsula facing the Bristol Channel, where stone tools have been found during excavations.

At the time, the average summer temperatures would have been about -10C (14F) across the "treeless landscape" complete with melting water as glaciers began to retreat to central Wales.

While the research has been hailed as a significant "rediscovery", mystery remains around the meaning behind the art.

Nash, associate professor of the University of Coimbra, Portugal, and a research fellow at Liverpool University, said: "We, in our 21st Century mindset, call it art, but at 17,100 years ago BP (before present), it probably was a communication system, for example...

"It's something which is way beyond our comprehension, and that's the big problem. We can't work that one out. I mean, if we were to find a lot more panels like it, then we could start making quite important about it, but as yet, we've found nothing."

Speaking on Radio Wales Drive, Nash added the horizontal bands could be "tally marks", perhaps from people telling others they had been at that cave for a number of years.

It is thought there could be also further prehistoric art hidden underneath the graffiti on the other side of the cave - painted by a local fisherman in the late 1800s.

In 1928, the initial discovery of the rock art was dismissed as "red oxide mineral seeping through the rock and not prehistoric art", the Guardian reported at the time.

It was rediscovered in 2022 after decades of being overlooked by archaeologists, partially due to the calcite flow on top of it making the rock art difficult to see.

Uranium-thorium dating has now been to examine the pigments, leading the international team conducting the research under Nash to conclude the lines were created by "human agency" rather than natural processes.

While the bands have been dated to 17,100 years old, the age of the mineral layer over the painting, Nash said the finger painting could in fact be much older.

Nash said: "I was taken aback that we were able to date it and analyse the pigments. This is an exciting rediscovery, significant in understanding what was going on in Wales in the deep past."

Where is Bacon Hole cave?

Bacon Hole is found within the limestone cliffs of south Gower, overlooking the Bristol Channel, and is under the custodianship of the National Trust Cymru.

Although it is in an area of outstanding natural beauty it is not protected as a scheduled monument, but archaeologists argue that it should now become one.

Nash said a steel grill had been put into the side chamber in the cave to stop any vandalism to the art, so the only painting's only visitors are the bats who live there.

The Bacon Hole discovery came a decade after Nash found a reindeer engraved on the wall of a cave nearby, which was confirmed in 2012 as the then-oldest known rock art in Britain in 2012.

The image in Cathole Cave on Gower, about 2.5 miles (4km) northwest of Bacon Hole, was created at least 14,000 years ago.

The research was conducted by First Art, a group of scientists, as well as academics from the universities of Southampton and Swansea, among others, with support from the National Trust and the Bradshaw Foundation.