Grotta dei Cervi | |
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| Alternative name | Grotta di Enea |
|---|---|
| Location | near Porto Badisco,OtrantoComune |
| Region | Province of Lecce,Apulia, Italy |
| Coordinates | 40°04′58″N18°29′06″E / 40.08278°N 18.48500°E /40.08278; 18.48500 |
| Type | limestonekarst cave complex |
| Part of | Peninsula Salentina |
| Length | 1,500 m (4,900 ft) |
| History | |
| Periods | lateNeolithic,Eneolithic, 6000 to 5000 yearsBP |
| Associated with | prehistoric settlers |
| Site notes | |
| Excavation dates | 1970 |
| Archaeologists | Paolo Graziosi |
| Management | University of Salento |
| Public access | no |
TheDeer Cave (Italian:Grotta dei Cervi - literally:Grotto of thestags) is a natural cave at theSalento coast near the town of Porto Badisco, around 8 km (5.0 mi) south ofOtranto inApulia, Italy. Unknown before 1970, it came to immediate international attention after the discovery of its impressive, innovative and enigmatic complex galleries of prehistoricparietal wall paintings.[1][2]
This complex of caves was discovered during an ongoing routine exploration of the local territory on February 1, 1970 by a team[a] ofspeleologists of theSalento Speleological Group"Pasquale de Laurentiis" fromMaglie. It was initially namedCave of Aeneas (Grotta di Enea) in reference toVirgil'sAeneid in which theTrojan heroAeneas first landed in Italy precisely in Porto Badisco.[3][4] The current name alludes to the omnipresence and significance ofdeer depictions among the cave's galleries. The location was soon closed to the public in order to ensure that the original environmental conditions essential for the conservation of the paintings are not disrupted.[5] Access to the cave remains restricted to authorized personnel and researchers only.[6][7]
TheGrotta dei Cervi, theGrotta Romanelli and theGrotta delle Veneri are all located in the coastal Karst formations on theSalento peninsula in southernApulia. Deemed to constitute a notable local cultural continuity ofPaleolithic andNeolithic human occupation, theMinistry of Cultural Heritage and Activities of Apulia formally submitted for the induction into theWorld Heritage List in 2006 and has receivedUNESCO's official notice and recognition asKarstic caves in prehistoric Apulia.[8]
Grotta dei Cervi is situated on the flank of a small valley opening to Porto Badisco. Exploration of the site is incomplete, however there are two entries and three main corridors (halls, galleries) with a combined length of more than 1,500 m (4,900 ft). Hundreds of paintings and an estimated 3000 individualpictograms, executed in black (batguano) and red (ochre) paint, are concentrated in groups in three galleries over a total distance of 600 m (2,000 ft) along the "wavy, milk colored" limestone walls.[9][10]
The first corridor is about 200 m (660 ft) long and splits into two branches. At the northern end of one of these, two human skeletons with heads missing were found. The second corridor is rich in paintings and can be accessed by a tunnel passage via the first corridor. This corridor widens towards the end with access to two successive rooms. In the middle of the corridor a pond has formed fed by dripping water. The section was used as a deposit or storage site for batguano, collected exclusively from inside the cave complex. The third corridor is also around 200 m (660 ft) long and its interior is accessible via the second hall through a very low opening.[10]
Two novel species ofAgromyces bacteria,Agromyces salentinus andAgromyces neolithicus, were identified from soil samples taken from outside and inside the cave, respectively.[11]
In response to the pending problem of public access restriction to the site theLecce provincial government approved the"Memorandum of Understanding for the creation and processing of three-dimensional virtual image reconstruction of the prehistoric paintings of the Cave of Porto Badisco and other related activities". A joint team of theNational Research Council Canada and theUniversity of Salento was granted access and has produced a3D documentation of the cave's interior. Two sets of high resolution and detailed three-dimensional acquisitions, along with two-dimensional images, were captured in 2005 and 2009 respectively. More than 100 gigabytes of data were collected - including 35 GB of data on the 3D structure and 65 digital photographs. A high resolution 3D virtual tour is commercially available onDVD.[12][13][7]
Critical statements have amounted to a near total consensus on the high degree of cultural and historical significance and the exceptional artistic quality of the cave's art. However, Paolo Graziosi's workThe prehistoric paintings in the caves of Porto Badisco (1980) remains the only scientific on-site documentation of the paintings.[7][14] Only very few conclusive interpretations that substantiate claims of historical significance are publicly available.[15][16] Galleries and blogs of the cave's images where amateurs engage in informal interpretation can be found on the internet. One of the most famous commented pictographs is the "dancing God", or possibly a dancing sorcerer.[17]
Maria Laura Leone's line of interpretation of the cave's artwork (with reference to Paolo Graziosi's 1980monograph) in her 2009 publication:The Phosphenic Deer Cave of Badisco - Art and Myth of the Shadows in Depth (abridged version):Direct Link
Leone suggests that the regularly recurring "deer" and hunting scenes represent some kind of "creation myth". The hunter accompanied by dogs was identified as aleitmotif and an epic analogy of "a mythic ancestor". Notable according to Leone is "the artist's simplifying deductive method by which he very capable and effectively records the complex visionary experience." Presentation of Neolithic art was indeed commanded by pictorial syntax and universal prehistoric cultural visual ideas.
Elettra Ingravallo offers an alternative approach towards an interpretation in her publication:The Grotta Dei Cervi (Otranto - Lecce).[18]
Elettra Ingravallo argues in close proximity to and support ofAby Warburg's concept of"Survival". An interpretation based on images is here fruitless, as the motives and the actual abstract process of the visual act is too much under the control of subconscious impulses and instincts.[19] She emphasizes that the incomplete knowledge of prehistoric societies and heterogeneous information on social and political organisation provides only a vague understanding of the true nature and correlation of power inside the Neolithic communities. It is not inappropriate, she writes to remind that difficulties remain for interpretations of the immaterial world of prehistory and its unexpressed concepts.
The paintings of the Grotta dei Cervi are attributed to the lateNeolithic that makes them 20,000 years more recent than most well knownPaleolithic cave paintings, such asLascaux andAltamira. Mediterranean societies of the late Neolithic era had begun to engage in community organisation and planning (Printed ceramics industry, farming, towns, religion) and individuals pursued the first specialized traits. The authors of these paintings had to be individuals invested with special functions, artist-shamans or in some way related to them.[10][20] The artwork composition, implementation, thorough planning and conceptual thinking suggests that these Neolithic artisans belonged to the greater European, Mediterranean, Trans-Alpine pan-culture, "that lived at the margins of agriculture", endowed with a common set of ideas and an inherit understanding of surreal and metaphoric concepts.[21]
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