Engaging the Paleolithic Images of Chauvet Cave

Engaging the Paleolithic Images of Chauvet Cave Nicholas S. Literski The prehistoric artists of Chauvet Cave likely never imagined their drawings would be discovered 35,000 years later, inspiring scholars from a wide range of academic disciplines. Scholarship thus far has focused primarily on artistic techniques and material culture remnants. Although these quantitative studies have revealed important data suggesting the cave’s use as a ritual space, the history and ceremonies of these ancient humans remain a mystery. This article demonstrates that depth psychology may be a valuable discipline for gaining further understanding of the cave’s ancient images. Depth psychologists have argued that the modern human unconscious retains vestiges of the archaic human psyche. In order to explore that premise, the author applies C. G. Jung’s technique of active imagination to selected Paleolithic images from within Chauvet Cave, amplifying the resulting materials in order to better contextualize them within the collective unconscious. Although this qualitative exploration cannot conclusively establish an accurate portrayal of what specific rituals were performed within the ancient cave, it offers potential insight into archaic elements that persist within the modern human psyche. The 1994 rediscovery of Chauvet Cave thus becomes not just a clue to our past, but a remarkable window upon our present. Since the rediscovery of Chauvet Cave in France’s Ardèche region in 1994, experts from many academic disciplines have studied the hundreds of Upper Paleolithic drawings within, seeking to interpret their production, function, and significance. While their findings are fascinating, we ultimately know little about the psyche of the ancient humans who created the images (Herzog, 2010). We do, however, know that the 35,000-year-old drawings elicit powerful emotions. Archeologists such as Kenneth Brophy and Vicki Cummings (2011) have long been aware that their work has a distinctly emotional component. “Psychoarchaeology,” they wrote, “is the study of the specific effects of archaeological sites on the emotions and behavior of individuals and communities. . . . These are the fusion points between past and present” (p. 137). Such an epistemology suggests that the images left by the earliest humans might provide us with a bridge between the ancient unconscious and our own. In this article, I explore that premise from a depth psychology perspective. Contemporary reactions to Chauvet Cave first became evident in December of 1994, when a small group of explorers searched along a limestone ridge in southern France, not far from the spectacular Pont d’Arc rock arch. Experienced cavers, they located subtle wisps of air that could indicate the presence of an undiscovered cavern in the honeycombed cliffs, and cleared enough loose rock to reveal an opening (Chauvet, Deschamps, & Hillaire, 1996). As they penetrated the depths of the cave, the explorers were soon overwhelmed by the sight of palm prints and hand stencils in red ochre, along with hundreds of detailed illustrations of animals. An unnamed party member related: During those moments there were only shouts and exclamations; the emotion that gripped us made us incapable of uttering a single word. Alone in that vastness, lit by the feeble beam of our lamps, we were seized by a strange feeling. Everything was so beautiful, so fresh, almost too much so. Time was abolished, as if the tens of thousands of years that separated us from the producers of these paintings no longer existed. It seemed as if they had just created these masterpieces. Suddenly we felt like intruders. Deeply impressed, we were weighed down by the feeling that we were not alone; the artists’ souls and spirits surrounded us. We thought we could feel their presence; we were disturbing them. (Chauvet et al., 1996, pp. 41–42) The words of Chauvet and his team are noticeably evocative of powerful dream experiences. The explorers felt disoriented, as if time were no longer relevant and the images were freshly painted. They felt like intruders, surrounded by remnants of the artists’ essences. Although the French government immediately closed the cave to all but a few approved specialists (Hammer, 2015a), enormous public interest motivated them to build a $62.5 million dollar simulacra, replicating even the temperature and odors of the site (Hammer, 2015b). Experts spent over 700 hours scanning the cave with lasers, preserving its images in the finest detail possible (Hammer, 2015b). During that process, prehistoric archeologist Julien Monney was granted access to the cave for five days, yet he was so overwhelmed by what he experienced that he declined the final day. Each night, he had dreamed of the cave lions prominently depicted in the cave, envisioning them both as paintings and as live beasts. Asked whether he was afraid during his dreams, Monney perceptively replied: “I was not afraid, no. No, no, I was not afraid. It was more a feeling of powerful things and deep things, a way to understand things which is not a direct way” (Herzog, 2010). Although Monney is not a depth psychologist, his sensations point toward depth psychology as an appropriate disciplinary context from which to study the images of Chauvet Cave. Monney understood his dreams as a valid and important way of comprehending his experience of the cave images. Depth psychology connects us with what Keiron Le Grice (2016) described as “an unsuspected realm of unconscious motivations, deeper life meanings, and powerful dynamisms that shape our lives in the background of our awareness” (p. 3), using resources such as dreams, images, and mythology to gain insight beyond strictly empirical means. The powerful, involuntary responses of both the cave discoverers and Monney suggest that the images of Chauvet Cave present an opening to unconscious forces. C. G. Jung (1933), founding father of analytical psychology, implied that responses such as these manifest an unconscious connection with the prehistoric artists, maintaining that “every civilized being, whatever his conscious development, is still an archaic man at the deeper levels of his psyche” (p. 126). Jung (1956/1967) elaborated on this concept in later years, writing: Just as our bodies still retain vestiges of obsolete functions and conditions in many of their organs, so our minds, which have apparently outgrown those archaic impulses, still bear the marks of the evolutionary stages we have traversed, and re-echo the dim bygone in dreams and fantasies. . . . The instinctive, archaic basis of the mind is a matter of plain objective fact and is no more dependent on individual experience or personal choice than is the inherited structure and functioning of the brain or any other organ. Just as the body has its evolutionary history and shows clear traces of the evolutionary stages, so too does the psyche. (pp. 28–29) Jung was not alone in theorizing that the ancient psyche remains present within modern humans. Psychologist Erich Neumann (1951/1959) wrote: The roots of every man’s personality extend beyond the historical area of his factual existence. . . . And if we follow the course of these roots, we pass through every stratum of history and prehistory. We encounter within ourselves the savage with his masks and rites; within ourselves we find the roots of our own culture, but we also find . . . the magical world of the Stone Age medicine man. (p. 131) Like Jung, Neumann observed that the human psyche carries within it vestiges of the ancient past. Both bring to mind Jung’s (1934/1969) identification of the collective unconscious, which he compared to an imaginary million-year-old person, comprehending all of human experience. We might reasonably conclude that it is possible for each of us to reach into, and draw from, these ancient vestiges. What method of examination will allow us to plumb this history contained within our own individual unconscious depths? Chauvet Cave has been examined closely from archeological, anthropological, and other scientific perspectives, in order to understand how humans of the Upper Paleolithic era lived and even created their art, yet the results of these studies have largely been limited to empirical reports (Clottes, 2003). Jung’s legacy and depth psychological methods of imaginal inquiry invite us to apply another form of examination, not to determine precisely what took place in Chauvet Cave thousands of years ago, but rather to explore what aspects of our own psyche we might carry from our earliest human ancestors. Active Imagination Depth psychology, concerned with methods of engaging with the unconscious, employs imaginal sources of knowing such as dreams, myth, and art. Rather than positivist data, the images manifested in these forms generate insight into a different sort of reality: the creative and intuitive nature of the unconscious mind (Dirkx, 2008). Despite our modern culture’s obsession with what can be measured and categorized, this different layer of reality should be no surprise to anyone. After all, perception is in the eye of the beholder. Two strangers viewing the same painting by an unknown artist at a gallery showing have two very different responses. Perhaps one will quickly discern the techniques, color choices, and skill level, perhaps even with disdain, whereas the other may be oblivious to these factors but burst into tears, inexplicably reminded of the moment her father died. The two strangers’ responses could be described in phenomenological terms, but their significance could not be reduced to some readily calculated algorithm. The images of Chauvet Cave were produced between 27,000 and 35,000 years ago (Clottes, 2003), and were likely seen by very few humans before they were hidden by a landslide that concealed the cave entrance. Now these images have been reproduced for millions to examine, not only in the cave replica, but also in a variety of media formats. The Chauvet Cave simulacra have a life of their own, having entered a context, mood, and scene that their originators could never have anticipated. In Cave of Forgotten Dreams, filmmaker Warner Herzog (2010) pondered aloud: “These images are memories of long-forgotten dreams. . . . Will we ever be able to understand the vision of the artists across such an abyss of time?” We could imagine Jung and Neumann answering in the affirmative, to the extent that the ancient psyche remains a part of our own modern psyche. Understanding dream images to be expressions of the unconscious, Jung (1950/1989) developed and taught a method that he termed active imagination (p. 169). In essence, this method consists of engaging an image as a distinct other with its own autonomy, taking note of what arises from that encounter, and examining the resulting material in light of personal and/or cultural parallels. Jung (1950/1989) emphasized that active imagination is premised upon the idea “that the images have a life of their own and that the symbolic events develop according to their own logic—that is, of course, if your conscious reason does not interfere” (p. 171). As Jung wrote advising one inquirer: Contemplate it and carefully observe how the picture begins to unfold or to change. Don’t try to make it into something, just do nothing but observe what its spontaneous changes are. . . . Note all these changes and eventually step into the picture yourself, and if it is a speaking figure at all then say what you have to say to that figure and listen to what he or she has to say. (Adler & Jaffé, 1973, p. 460) Although one might use intentional methods to initiate active imagination, one must also allow the results to develop of their own accord, avoiding any attempt to consciously direct their outcome. Jung (1950/1989) identified the results of active imagination as an “active, purposeful creation” (p. 171) of the unconscious, which can become meaningful through comparison with broader cultural images and ideas. Writing in the context of guiding an analytic patient through this process, Jung stated: This comparative work gives us a most valuable insight into the structure of the unconscious. You have to hand the necessary parallels to the patients too . . . For he can see real meaning [of the active imagination images] only when they are not just a queer subjective experience with no external connections, but a typical, ever-recurring expression of the objective facts and processes of the human psyche. . . . Then he can really see it, and the unconscious becomes understandable to him. (Jung, 1950/1989, p. 173) This practice of amplification, which includes comparing images with sources from the wider culture and various mythologies, moves the active imagination process beyond personal experience, giving depth to the images and revealing the workings of the human unconscious (Shamdasani, 2009). Hillman elaborated, explaining that this process allows us to “feed [the image] with further images that increase its volume and depth and release its fecundity” (Hillman & Moore, 1991, pp. 59–60). Amplification, as part of the active imagination process, is especially useful here, as we have no continuity with the ancient artists’ culture. As archeologist Monney stated concerning his work in Chauvet Cave, “We will never know because the past is definitely lost. We will never reconstruct the past” (Herzog, 2010). Approaching the Images The goal of active imagination is to engage the image as an autonomous entity and observe what unfolds as a manifestation of the unconscious. The exact method of that engagement, however, can differ widely depending on the personality, abilities, and preferences of the individual (Mecouch, 2016). The critical component seems to be the suspension of ego, a willingness to allow the unconscious material to come forward in whatever form it assumes, unfettered by conscious direction (Jung, 1957/1960). The idea of voluntarily releasing conscious control and opening to the unconscious runs parallel with ancient practices of shamanism, in particular that of the shamanic journey (Smith, 2007). In shamanic journeying, an individual enters into a visionary trancelike state, typically with the aid of drums, rattles, or similar rhythmic instruments. This is significant, as Jung (1950/1989) indicated that active imagination might proceed from “a dream or an impression of a hypnagogic nature” (p. 171). Michael Harner (1980/1990), credited with reviving shamanic practices for a wider audience in the modern era, wrote that events and interactions during the “shamanic state of consciousness” (p. 21) have the character of waking dreams. Archeologists and prehistorians such as Clottes and Lewis-Williams (1998) have long theorized that the layout and illustrations found in Upper Paleolithic caves such as Chauvet reflect shamanic practice. Although such characterizations were initially met with resistance by strict empiricists, the modern consensus is that Chauvet Cave likely functioned as sacred ritual space (State Party of France, 2014). The cave contains no artifacts of ordinary life tasks. The drawings predominately depict dangerous creatures such as lions and bears, rather than the game animals hunted by early humans (Clottes & Lewis-Williams, 1998). The artists did not simply attempt to depict their external environment. Rather than ordinary scenes, the drawings seem to portray dreamscapes (Clottes, 2003). Herzog (2010) described how torchlight, combined with the artistic impression of motion in the painted animals, created a “proto-cinema.” As one reviewer described his experience seeing the film, “This is no gallery. This is a place where the animals are alive” (McBurney, 2011, par. 16). It is as if the images of Chauvet Cave were designed to be experienced and interacted with, not merely seen. In light of these observations, I endeavored to explore the images of Chauvet Cave through active imagination and shamanic journeying. Informed by my own experience as a trained shamanic practitioner, I worked with three prominent images from the cave. I endeavored to create circumstances resembling those under which the images were observed in ancient times by projecting them in large scale in an otherwise darkened room. During each exercise, I played a recorded drumming track, approximating the rapid beat that shamanic practitioners have historically used to induce their hypnogogic states (Harner, 1980/1990). Immediately after each exercise, I recorded the experience in writing, after which I consulted outside sources to amplify the material generated. Researchers at the Bradshaw Foundation have referred to the three Chauvet Cave images I engaged as the “Red Hand and Mammoth Panel,” the “Bear Skull Altar,” and the “Venus and Sorcerer Panel” (Bradshaw Foundation, 2011). The Red Hand and Mammoth Panel [COMP: Insert Red Hand and Mammoth Panel art here] I began my active imagination with the projected image and drumming track, as planned. At first, I had some difficulty. I was faced with the stark, bright-red stencil image of a human hand, painted whattoseemed thethe beginning an animal form painted charcoal. Asover I begin relax into drumming, a young man’s voiceincomes to me: “I was here,” he declares to me, “before the spirits became angry and buried the sacred beginning place.” The young man tells me of his first visit to the cave. It was a place of fear and power. It was where he and his people came from, long before all the grandfathers. It was said that if a man came here, he would one day return after his death to be with the grandfathers. He was told all his life that there were pictures in the cave—some were of animals, but some were secret, and only those who came to the cave could know of them. Nobody knew for sure where the pictures came from. Some said they were from the grandfathers, but others said that the spirits made the pictures, before any of his people were here. He was told to come to the cave one morning, bringing nothing but a torch to light his way. The men told him to go into the cave. He did as he was told, struggling to carry his torch. It seemed such a long climb to him in the darkness, but at last in the light of his torch, he saw a grandfather. This was no man he knew from outside—this grandfather was filled with power that none of the outside grandfathers had. The grandfather told the young man that he was now in the Place of Beginning. In the torchlight, red handprints appeared on the walls. The grandfather gave him a bowl of what looked like blood, and told him how to make his own handprint, to show that he had visited the Place of Beginning. After he did as he was told, the grandfather left him there alone, with nothing to do but look upon his own handprint in the midst of all the others that had come before him. My active imagination in connection with the Red Hand and Mammoth Panel included key images of a torch, a descent, Grandfather, blood, and hands. In order for these images to become useful beyond a merely personal level, Jung (1950/1989) insisted that they be compared to external sources. The torch reminds me of Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods and delivered it to humankind. Chevalier and Gheerbrant (1996) point out that the torch figures prominently in Greek mythology, lighting the ways of both Demeter and Hecate after Persephone was dragged to the underworld. Further, they note the role of a priestly torchbearer in the rites of Eleusis. Accordingly, they conclude that the torch lights the way to both the underworld and enlightenment—which seems entirely in accord with this active imagination narrative, which for me feels so strongly reflective of an initiation. The theme of descent additionally brings to mind Jung’s (1961) dream, in which he found himself searching the lower, successively more ancient stories of an unfamiliar house. Reflecting on the dream, Jung concluded that each floor represented an earlier stage of human consciousness. In light of this active imagination, it seems significant that Jung described the deepest level of the house as if it were a subterranean cave, scattered with dust and human bones. In the cave, I discovered remains of a primitive culture, which can scarcely be reached or illuminated by consciousness. The primitive psyche of man borders on the life of the animal soul, just as the caves of prehistoric times were usually inhabited by animals before men laid claim to them. (Jung, 1961, p. 160) For Jung, this image of descent became an early indication that the human psyche retains a collective, a priori level of consciousness. “Later, with increasing experience and on the basis of more reliable knowledge,” he wrote, “I recognized them as forms of instinct, that is, as archetypes” (p. 161). The grandfather figure echoes the wise old man, which Jung described as an archetypal image of the spirit. Le Grice (2016) wrote that the wise old man represents a source of wisdom or knowledge beyond rational awareness, “especially critical in the death–rebirth experiences occurring during individuation” (p. 57). As such, it is particularly notable that the young man who spoke in this active imagination specifically stated that the grandfather was not one of the elders known to him outside the cave. The wise old man is the wise mentor who appears unbidden on the road of the initiate. Blood figures into this active imagination in a most particular way, not as the literal bodily fluid, but rather as its likeness or symbol in pigment. Ronnberg and Martin (2010) posited that once spilled from the body, blood represents a “haunting symbol of death” (p. 396). A series of entirely consistent concepts begins to congeal here, with torches lighting the way to the underworld, the bones of Jung’s basement cave, the wise old man’s relationship with the death– rebirth cycle, and now the shed blood. In the active imagination, the young man speaks of his red handprint showing his link with the grandfathers of his people. As an avid genealogist, I resonate deeply with this sense of connection to generations gone before. The young man speaks a mythology of visiting the cave as a means of one day returning to be with the grandfathers themselves. A ritual death and afterlife emerge in sharp relief. For me, the enduring image from this active imagination is the hand. Hands appear to be one of the most ubiquitous and multivalent images known to humans (Chevalier & Gheerbrant, 1996). They are also one of the most common images found in Chauvet Cave, and the first to be noticed by the cave’s discoverers (Chauvet et al., 1996). It is impossible for me to ignore the simple fact that this active imagination provides a possible scenario of how some of these handprints may have been created. Notably, Chevalier and Gheerbrant (1996) suggested among a multitude of meanings that the hand can represent a transference of power, whereas Clottes and Lewis-Williams (1998) theorized that the handprints indicate an effort to merge with, or even pass through, the cave walls in a shamanic sense of making spiritual connection. Ronnberg and Martin (2010), speaking directly in the context of cave images, wrote that “the distinctive five fingers upraised suggest the expressive potential of emerging human consciousness brought into realization by hands like those that produced these incomparable images” (p. 380). These concepts of connection and breaking through psychic barriers seem particularly apt in the context of this active imagination. Bringing these amplified images together, the rediscovery of Chauvet Cave may be seen as an initiatory adventure for our species as the ancient dead are reborn into consciousness. As modern humans descend with their electrical torches into the underworld of the cave (or at least its exacting replica), archaic aspects of the human psyche reach out to the contemporary age, and we are transformed after joining our hands with those of the artists who have become wise old men and wise old women for our age. Indeed, when personally visiting the replica cave recently, my impulse was to reach out and place my own hand within the handprints of the ancients. Has our modern world shifted in such a way that the reemergence of these ancient images has become necessary to our recalibration? This active imagination would seem to suggest as much. The Bear Skull Altar [COMP: Insert Bear Skull Altar art here] Within one of the central chambers of Chauvet Cave, a block of stone long ago broke from the ceiling, creating a flat pedestal on the cave floor. Between 28,000 and 35,000 years ago, some human hand appears to have taken advantage of this circumstance, carefully centering the large skull of a cave bear atop the natural pillar. Although it seems difficult not to see the intentional creation of an altar, archeologists are careful not to read too much into this spectacle. Chauvet et al. (1996) point out that other cave bear skulls exist in the space, and the skull could conceivably have landed in this spot as a result of animal action or even floodwaters. How the Bear Skull Altar was created, however, is ultimately irrelevant. It stands unique among the images of Chauvet Cave in that it has a sculptural character, whereas the other images consist of various decorations on the cave walls. I feel that its distinction and impressive character encourage further exploration by means of active imagination. As I stare into the eyes and teeth of the cave bear skull, I suddenly find myself shrinking, or the stone altar growing to enormous size, or perhaps both. The teeth extend over the edge of the stone and tower above me. Then we are eye to eye again, and the skull speaks. “We were here before your people, but unlike you, we are no more. I have remained here in this darkness, waiting all these ages, to bear witness. You were in awe of me once, yet I fell away. I guard the secret of your life and your death, and so I remain. The spirits who hid me away have revealed me now, and what will you do with it?” In this shorter active imagination, the prominent images seem to remain the stone altar, the teeth, and the bear. Altars, wrote Chevalier and Gheerbrant (1996), represent a certain distilled holiness, even the center of the universe. Hillman (1975), looking to the ancient Greeks, suggested that altars represent a container for the various manifestations of the psyche. Perhaps the shifting size of the altar in this active imagination leaves space for both macrocosm and microcosm at once. In terms of my own personal background, altars represent places of sacrifice and obligation. Teeth, wrote Ronnberg and Martin (2010), “have ever been an image of potential devouring” (p. 370). The prominent canines of this particular image have been regarded in multiple cultures as signs of aggression and strength (Chevalier & Gheerbrant, 1996). Here they were indeed aggressively displayed, initially enlarged and hanging overhead past the edge of the altar in a way that felt powerful and threatening. They demand to be taken seriously. Chevalier and Gheerbrant further note, however, that the canines were a symbol of vitality in Vedic culture. Juxtaposed here with the apparently dead remains, the emphasis of the teeth would seem to lend that same sense of vitality to the cave bear skull, enabling it to speak from antiquity. The cave bear, ursus spelaeus, has been extinct for approximately 24,000 years, disappearing roughly 4,000 years after Chauvet Cave was sealed shut by a landslide. The cause of their decline appears to have been the spread of human populations, whether through hunting or competition for resources (Stiller et al., 2010). Notwithstanding this ecological conflict, Native Americans considered the bear closely related to humans, due in part to its ability to stand and move on its hind legs (Andrews, 1993). Jung (1952/1968), in his studies of alchemy, noted that the bear represents the “chthonic element,” the “dangerous aspect of the prima materia” (p. 187). This, of course, seems particularly apropos given the subterranean location of the bear in this active imagination, let alone the Bear Skull Altar itself. Ronnberg and Martin (2010), also drawing upon alchemical traditions, connected bears with “the potentially devouring affective energies of psyche’s unconscious realm that can seize us destructively, especially if we are naïve or disrespectful enough to underestimate their significance” (p. 272). Little wonder, then, that the bear skull and its altar suddenly took on such an impression of enormity in this active imagination! At the same time, however, Ronnberg and Martin note that the powerful beast’s habit of winter sleep and spring renewal has made it an emblem of death and rebirth. Has this image slept for 27,000 years, only to be awakened and rebirthed in our own time? Perhaps in view of these traditions, the Bear Skull Altar’s question of what we will do with its witness is an offering of hope, rather than merely a warning. Lying within the archaic darkness of the unconscious may be a key to emergent new light and life. The Venus and Sorcerer Panel [COMP: Insert Venus and Sorcerer Panel art here] Within the end chamber of Chauvet Cave, there are nearly 150 animals depicted, over a third of all the animals illustrated in the entire cave (Clottes, 2003). Enormous herds of animals on the chamber’s left wall, a tapered outcropping is decorated with the only detailed human figures found in the cave. In the foreground of this image stands a figure with the lower body of a man and the upper body of a bison. “He” resembles somewhat similar figures found in other caves, which have been interpreted as shamans or sorcerers; hence this panel was earlier referred to only as the Sorcerer’s Panel (Chauvet et al., 1996). Behind the man–bison figure, however, a female figure stands. Her pubic region is perhaps the focal point of the entire image, framed in the sweep of her thighs and legs. Her head appears above, but the bison head hides her torso. She closely resembles the goddess figurines found throughout the region, most of which date from the later Neolithic period (Gimbutas, 1991). As I gaze on the image, I am taken into the scene depicted. There is firelight. A woman reclines in the center of the space, nude and clearly in the process of childbirth. A male figure dances around her, wearing only the bison head mask. He protects her; he fights off other spirits to keep the child pure. This is no ordinary birth. The woman was chosen to give birth to her child in this place—the place where her own mother gave birth to her long ago. If the child is male, he will grow up to wear the bison head mask. If the child is female, she will repeat what her mother now does, as the grandmothers have done since the first grandmother. For a moment, I see through her eyes, or else I am her. I feel no pain. I have been given some substance that makes things appear strange, even surreal. I see the animals on the walls dancing in the light of the flames. I see the bison-headed man circling me, sometimes a man, sometimes a beast. I come out of her and again see the scene from my own eyes. Her time is closer, and her cries begin to echo loudly in the cave, as if all the grandmothers have joined with her voice. She delivers a male child, with the help of the bison-headed man, and I am released from the scene. Similar to the first active imagination, this one is couched in a clear ritual context. The predominant images appear to be the archetypal notion of the Great Mother in childbirth, the bison, and the male child. The Great Mother here corresponds to the cave itself, as the deep womb of the earth (Chevalier & Gheerbrant, 1996). Archeo-mythologist Marija Gimbutas (1989) wrote that the “life- and birth-giving aspects of the Goddess is one of the oldest that can be detected and also one of the best preserved to this day in the European subculture” (p. 109). Notably in terms of two of these active imaginations, Gimbutas notes that the life-giving goddess’s identity was doubtless carried down through the grandmothers (in distinction to the priestly grandfathers) and “also appeared in zoomorphic form . . . as a bear” (p. 111). The bison or buffalo appears in Native American culture as a symbol of abundance (Andrews, 1993). Gimbutas (1989) noted the persistence of bison within animal whirls, or circular processions. While acknowledging that their meaning is not fully known, she wrote that their appearance, alongside goddess symbols, “suggest[s] a link with a deity in whose power was the promotion and control of the life-cycle from birth to death and from death to regeneration” (p. 302). In this vein, perhaps the bison-headed man in this active imagination was not just been protecting the woman as he danced around her, but also acknowledging her supremacy in the life-cycle. This perspective seems to reflect how I experienced myself within her during the active imagination. The male infant, of course, appears as child of the Great Mother goddess throughout ancient mythology (Kerenyi, 1951/1980). Jung (1954/1968) pointed out that the divine child is symbolic of the promise of future development. Just as in nature, as the product of masculine and feminine forces in opposition, the divine child represents something new and mysterious: “Out of this collision of opposites the unconscious psyche always creates a third thing of an irrational nature, which the conscious mind neither expects nor understands” (p. 167). As a father who witnessed the miracle of childbirth, I connect with this deep mystery. Simply knowing the biology of procreation falls far short of comprehending the sense of awe that the newborn child carries with him or her. In the context of this active imagination, the child comes forth from the Great Mother, who resides in the deepest part of the cave—the womb of the earth. He carries forth a legacy of prior generations, and offers a link between the archaic ancestors and modern humanity. His appearance thus provides a fitting close to these imaginative scenes. Conclusion As noted before, the intent of these active imaginations was not to somehow divine an accurate or literal portrayal of what took place in Chauvet Cave 30,000 years ago, nor to identify the original meaning of these images for their creators. Indeed, a few of the details seem out of accord with evidence that archeologists have gathered. We can never truly know the history of Chauvet Cave and its visitors. These explorations are not so much about the ancient cave, as they are about archaic elements that remain within the human unconscious. Referring to other awe-inspiring images from the ancient world, Hillman (1983/2013) pointed out that our fascination is not with mere history, but rather with sensing the essence of what it is to be human. Chauvet Cave offers us the opportunity, through depth psychology and the gift of imaginal knowing, to join with our prehistoric ancestors, even as the divine child suggests. Chauvet Cave breathed forth its contents in 1994, revealing itself through gentle air currents to a group of careful explorers. To the extent that we allow its rediscovered images to inspire our own modern psyche, the cave breathes within us, even now. Nicholas S. Literski is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in depth psychology, with emphasis in Jungian and archetypal studies, at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Carpinteria, CA. With master’s degrees in both depth psychology and spiritual guidance, Nick maintains a spiritual guidance practice in the Portland, OR area. For more information, please visit www.dancingancestors.com. Further Reading Adler, G., & Jaffe', A. (Eds.). (1973). C. G. Jung letters. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Andrews, T. (1993). Animal speak: The spiritual and magical powers of creatures great and small. Woodbury, MN: Llewellyn. Brophy, K., & Cummings, V. (2011). Psychoarchaeology: Theories, methods and practice. Session presented at the thirty-third annual Theoretical Archaeology Group Conference, Birmingham, UK. Retrieved from https://antiquity.ac.uk/sites/default/files/downloads/tag/TAG_2011_abstracts_2.pdf Chauvet, J. M., Deschamps, E. B., & Hillaire, C. (1996). Dawn of art: The Chauvet Cave—the oldest known paintings in the world. New York, NY: Harry N. Abrams. Chevalier, J., & Gheerbrant, A. (1996). The Penguin dictionary of symbols. London, UK: Penguin. Clottes, J. (Ed.). (2003). Chauvet Cave: The art of earliest times. Salt Lake City, Utah: University of Utah Press. Clottes, J., & Lewis-Williams, D. (1998). The shamans of prehistory: Trance and magic in the painted caves. New York, NY: Harry N. Abrams. Dirkx, J. M. (2008). Care of the self: Mythopoetic dimensions of professional preparation and development. In T. Leonard & P. Willis (Eds.), Pedagogies of the imagination: Mythopoetic curriculum in educational practice (pp. 65-82). New York, NY: Springer Science + Business Media B. V. Gimbutas, M. (1989). The language of the goddess: Unearthing the hidden symbols of Western civilization. San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row. Gimbutas, M. (1991). The civilization of the goddess: The world of Old Europe. San Francisco, CA: Harper San Francisco. Hammer, J. (2015a). Only a handful of people can enter the Chauvet Cave each year. Our reporter was one of them. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/only-handful-people-can-enter-chauvet-caveeach-year-our-reporter-was-one-of-the-180954981 Hammer, J. (2015b). Finally, the beauty of France's Chauvet Cave makes its grand public debut. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved from http://www.smithsonianmag.com Harner, M. (1980/1990). The way of the shaman (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Harper & Row. Herzog, W. (2010). Cave of forgotten dreams [Motion picture]. Los Angeles, CA: Creative Differences Productions. Hillman, J. (1975). Re-visioning psychology. New York, NY: Harper. Hillman, J. (2013). Old and new: Senex and puer. In G. Slater (Ed.), Senex and puer (Vol. 3, pp. 306–315). Putnam, CT: Spring Publications. (Original work published 1983) Hillman, J., & Moore, T. (Eds.). (1991). A blue fire: Selected writings by James Hillman. New York, NY: Harper Perennial. Jung, C. G. (1933). Modern man in search of a soul. New York, NY: Harcourt. Jung, C. G. (1969). Basic postulates of analytical psychology. In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 8. Structure and dynamics of the psyche (2nd ed., pp. 338–357). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1934) Jung, C. G. (1989). The Tavistock lectures on the theory and practice of analytical psychology. In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 18. The symbolic life (2nd ed., pp. 5–184). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1950) Jung, C. G. (1968). The symbolism of the mandala. In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 12. Psychology and alchemy (pp. 95-224). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1952) Jung, C. G. (1968).. In H. Read et al (Ed.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 9.1. Archetypes and the collective unconscious (2nd ed.). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1955) Jung, C. G. (1967). An analysis of the prelude to a case of schizophrenia. In H. Read et al. (Eds.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol 5. Symbols of transformation (2nd ed.). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1956) Jung, C. G. (1960). The transcendent function. In H. Read, et al. (Ed.), The collected works of C. G. Jung: Vol. 8. The structure and dynamics of the psyche (2nd ed., pp. 67–91). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1957) Jung, C. G. (1961). Memories, dreams, reflections. New York, NY: Random House. Kerenyi, C. (1980). The gods of the Greeks. New York, NY: Thames & Hudson. (Original work published 1951) Le Grice, K. (2016). Archetypal reflections: Insights and ideas from Jungian psychology. London, UK: Muswell Hill Press. McBurney, S. (2011, March 17). Herzog's cave of forgotten dreams: The real art underground. Retrieved April 4, 2016, from http://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/mar/17/wernerherzog-cave-of-forgotten-dreams Mecouch, G. (2016). Jung's lament. Psychological Perspectives, 59(3), 376–390. Neumann, E. (1959). Art and time. In R. Manheim (Ed.), Art and the creative unconscious: Four essays (pp. 81–134). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1951) Ronnberg, A., & Martin, K. (2010). The book of symbols: Reflections on archetypal images. Los Angeles, CA: Taschen. Shamdasani, S. (2009). Introduction. In C. G. Jung, The red book (pp. 193–221). New York, NY: Norton. Smith, C. M. (2007). Jung and shamanism in dialogue: Retrieving the soul/retrieving the sacred (2nd ed.). Bloomington, IN: Trafford Publishing. State Party of France. (2014). Nomination files of the decorated cave of Pont d'Arc, known as Grotte Chauvet-Pont d'Arc, Ardeche. Paris, France: United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Retrieved from whc.unesco.org/uploads/nominations/1426.pdf Stiller, M., Baryshnikov, G., Bocherens, H., D'Anglade, A. G., Hilpert, B., Munzel, S. C., . . . Knapp, M. (2010). Withering away—25,000 years of genetic decline preceded cave bear extinction. Molecular Biology and Evolution, 27(5), 975–978. Image Captions Red Hand and Mammoth Panel image. Photograph credit, Claude Valette. Used with permission. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution—Share Alike 4.0 International license. Bear Skull and Altar Panel image. Photograph credit, Patrick Aventurier, Caverne du Pont d’Arc. Used with permission. Venus and Sorcerer Panel image. Photograph credit, Claude Valette. Used with permission, Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution—Share Alike 4.0 International license. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Psychological Perspectives: A Quarterly Journal of Jungian Thought on December 17, 2018, available online at http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/00332925.2018.1495921