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Fig. 220. Map of the cavern of Font-de-Gaume, showing the 'Rubicon,' the Grande Galerie des Fresques, in which the chief polychrome paintings are found, and the Diverticule final. After Capitan.

Fig. 221. Narrow passage in the cavern of Font-de-Gaume, known as the 'Rubicon.' On the left wall at this point are two painted bison, and on both walls are marks left by the claws of the cave-bear. After Lassalle.

The grand cavern of Font-de-Gaume,[(27)] on the Beune, not far from Les Eyzies, contains the most complete record of Upper Palæolithic art, especially from the close of Aurignacian to the close of Magdalenian times. There are crude Aurignacian drawings, simple outlines painted in black, outlines supplemented by the indication of hair (examples of the early stages in the development of polychrome work as well as of the very highest stages), compositions like the lion and the group of horses, and the murals in the Galerie des Fresques, which show a general composition in the processions of animals, as well as some special compositions such as the reindeer and bison facing each other. The life depicted is largely that of the tundras, mammoths, rhinoceroses, and reindeer, but it also includes the steppe or Celtic type of horse, represented galloping (Fig. 211), and a small group of horses of the Arab or Celtic type. Of the meadow fauna the bison is generally represented in preference to the wild ox or urus.

Fig. 222. Plan of a portion of the left wall decoration in the Galerie des Fresques at Font-de-Gaume, showing reindeer and the procession of bison. After Breuil.