Jean Clottes | |
|---|---|
 Jean Clottes (2008) | |
| Born | (1933-09-08)8 September 1933 (age 92) Espéraza, France |
| Citizenship | French |
| Alma mater | University of Toulouse |
| Known for | Cave art |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Archaeology |
| Institutions | Ministry of Culture |
Jean Clottes is a prominent Frenchprehistorian. He was born in theFrench Pyrenees in 1933[1][2] and began to studyarchaeology in 1959, while teaching high school. He initially focused onNeolithicdolmens, which were the topic of his 1975 Ph.D. thesis at theUniversity of Toulouse.[1][3] After being appointed director of prehistoric antiquities for theMidi-Pyrénées in 1971, he began to study prehistoriccave art in order to fulfill the responsibilities of that position.[3] In the following years he led a series of excavations of prehistoric sites in the region. In 1992, he was named General Inspector for Archaeology at theFrench Ministry of Culture; in 1993 he was appointed Scientific Advisor for prehistoricrock art at the French Ministry of Culture. He formally retired in 1999, but remains an active contributor to the field.[1]
To date he has written over 300 scientific papers, and has edited, co-edited, written, or co-authored a total of over 20 books.[2] He has also lectured around the world, taught at the University of Toulouse and theUniversity of California at Berkeley, and engaged in numerous public outreach and professional service activities.[1][2] He has received several honors from the French government and also from the BlueTuareg people of theSahara Desert, who made him an honorary Tuareg in 2007.[2]
Clottes took a leading role in the study of two of the most famous prehistoric painted caves discovered to date: the underwaterCosquer cave, discovered in 1985 in cliffs at the shore nearMarseille; and the spectacularChauvet Cave, discovered in 1994.[3]Radiocarbon dating showed that the paintings of Chauvet are approximately 30,000-32,000 years old, more than 2,000 years older than the next-oldest known cave paintings.[3][4] The revelation of Chauvet's beautiful and often highly sophisticated paintings was seen as a blow to theories arguing that art history is a story of "progress" from crude, clumsy beginnings succeeded by increasing levels of sophistication.[3][4]
Some of Clottes's most publicized contributions to the study of prehistory have come not in the form of field research, but in his efforts to propose a plausible theory of the psychological and social context in which prehistoric cave art was created.[3][5] In 1994 he joined with South AfricananthropologistDavid Lewis-Williams to study prehistoric art in light of knownneuropsychological phenomena associated withshamanictrances.[3][5][6] Together they concluded that there is a strong argument for believing that much of prehistoric art was in fact produced in the context of shamanic practices. In 1996 they published their findings in the bookLes Chamanes de la Préhistoire: Transe et Magie dans les Grottes Ornées (published in English in 1998 asThe Shamans of Prehistory: Trance and Magic in the Painted Caves).[5]
The book received heavy criticism from some other researchers, with some objections stemming from a reluctance to use modernethnographic orpsychological observations as a basis for speculating on the meaning of prehistoric art, following clumsy early-20th-century attempts to do so. Other experts found the ideas compelling, and suggested that academic infighting or jealousy may have played a role in the criticism.[3] In response to their critics, Clottes and Lewis-Williams published an expanded version of their book in 2001 (Les Chamanes de la Préhistoire: Texte Intégral, Polémique et Réponses). David Lewis-Williams later went on to develop aspects of their thesis more fully in his own bookThe Mind in the Cave[6] and its sequel,Inside the Neolithic Mind (co-authored by David Pearce).[7]
