Cuciulat Cave ( ro, Peștera Cuciulat) is located on the Podișul Someșan plateau, near the village Cuciulat in the commune

Letca Letca ( hu, Létka) is a Commune in Romania, commune located in Sălaj County, Transylvania, Romania. It is composed of nine villages: Ciula (''Gyulaszeg''), Cuciulat (''Kocsoládfalva''), Cozla (''Kecskés''), Letca, Lemniu (''Lemény''), Purcă ...

, Sălaj County,

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

. It contains the oldest known cave paintings in

Central Europe Central Europe is an area of Europe between Western Europe and Eastern Europe, based on a common historical, social and cultural identity. The Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) between Catholicism and Protestantism significantly shaped the area' ...

. The cave has been known to locals long before

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, after which it was partially destroyed due to limestone quarrying that included the use of

explosives An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An expl ...

. On 28 July 1978, a team of speleologists (A. Done, F. Cucu, T. Vadeanu, M. Codrescu, Simona Manolescu) from the Emil Racoviță Speleologic Club ( ro, Clubul de Speologie Emil Racoviţă) explored the cave, noticing the existence of cave rock paintings in one of the caverns. The following spring

archeologist Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts ...

Marin Cârciumaru accompanied by two team members launched the scientific research. Inside a moderately sized cavern of approximately , besides a well preserved image of a

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...

, an image of a feline, the representation of a

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...

, of another horse and an image that vaguely resembled a

human figure The nude, as a form of visual art that focuses on the unclothed human figure, is an enduring tradition in Western art. It was a preoccupation of Ancient Greek art, and after a semi-dormant period in the Middle Ages returned to a central position ...

were discovered. A chemical analysis established that the paintings were executed with red

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

rich in

iron oxide Iron oxides are chemical compounds composed of iron and oxygen. Several iron oxides are recognized. All are black magnetic solids. Often they are non-stoichiometric. Oxyhydroxides are a related class of compounds, perhaps the best known of whic ...

s (13% Fe₂ O₃). Marin Cârciumaru, according to analogies in Europe, estimated that the Cuciulat cave paintings were completed during the Upper Paleolithic, about 12,000 years ago. This dating could not be supported by other evidence of archaeological nature. A significant part of the cave had been already destroyed by quarrying, including possible traces of a

human habitation Habitability refers to the adequacy of an environment for human living. Where housing is concerned, there are generally local ordinances which define habitability. If a residence complies with those laws it is said to be habitable. In extreme e ...

in the cave or in its immediate vicinity. It compromised the chances to discover artifacts that would provide additional clues for the dating of the paintings. The individual images are silhouettes with neither outlines nor any

shading Shading refers to the depiction of depth perception in 3D models (within the field of 3D computer graphics) or illustrations (in visual art) by varying the level of darkness. Shading tries to approximate local behavior of light on the object's ...

. The painted horse is long and high, the bird is long and high. The image that resembles a human, in a very poor state of conservation, is high and wide. In 1985 the entrance of the cave became inaccessible due to a

landslide Landslides, also known as landslips, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, deep-seated grade (slope), slope failures, mudflows, and debris flows. Landslides occur in a variety of ...

inside the former quarry area. In this context, the present condition of the cave paintings is not known. The interest for the Cuciulat cave and its cave paintings has been recently revived. A new research and excavation campaign is under discussion on the basis of contemporary techniques and dating methods, that might also allow eventual identification of drawings that were possibly omitted during the 1979 campaign.

References

External links

Romanian Cave May Boast Central Europe's Oldest Cave Art

{{Navbox prehistoric caves Caves of Romania Limestone caves Rock art in Europe Archaeological sites in Romania