Laja Alta Cave
The cave or shelter of La Laja Alta is an example of rock art in Spain and belongs to the so-called Schematic Style, which due to its location is also included in the so-called southern art. It was located in Jimena de la Frontera (Cádiz) in 1978 by Salvador Corbacho Rey, a resident of this town, who informed the authorities of the Ministry of Culture of the discovery. Although these pictorial representations were published for the first time towards the end of the seventies of the XX century, although the most recent study systematic work carried out was made known in the early eighties of the same century. In 2018, a more systematic analysis was published using new documentation methods, which has significantly increased the number of known figures and provided the first absolute dating.
It is a set of cave motifs painted mostly in red, with some figures also in black. The fifty-nine recognized motifs belong to the Schematic Style whose central element is a group of vessels that could be considered a naval scene or even a catalog of prehistoric vessels.
Features
The site is a small rocky hollow located near the Strait of Gibraltar. The place is located in the western region of the Betic Mountain Range, which separates the Atlantic and Mediterranean basins. The shelter is located at 370 m altitude in the so-called Gamero Gorge, on the Jateadero farm. This valley opens to the bed of the Hozgarganta River, a tributary of the Guadiaro that flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The coastline is located 27 km in a straight line from the shelter, although it can be seen from this place. However, it is located on the natural land route that connects the coastal slopes of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. Its importance lies in the representations of vessels that would form a naval scene. Traditionally it has been interpreted that it would narrate a singular event: the meeting of the populations of the eastern Mediterranean, with a considerable degree of mastery of navigation, and the indigenous populations of the south of the Iberian Peninsula. However, the latest contributions question this interpretation. Firstly, due to the architecture of the boats itself and, secondly, due to recent absolute dating. These representations have also been interpreted as a simple fishing scene.
The rock of the cavity is Paleocene sandstone belonging to the Campo de Gibraltar Complex. The shelter was formed by wind erosion, a process that continues today due to the easterly winds that affect the entire left and upper part of the cavity, so it can be assumed that other representations must have existed in this area that have disappeared.
In addition to boats, there are multiple reasons. The anthropomorphic schematics (ancoriform and phi) dominate along with the pectiniformes/zoomorphs and, to a lesser extent, ramiforms, oculates, circular motifs, soliform, tectiform and simple lines.
Chronology of boat representations
There is an arduous debate about the true age of the ships. Until recently, they were traditionally interpreted as vessels from a historical period. The first contributions proposed that they were schematizations of Phoenician ships, reinforced by the supposed representation of a Cothon type pier. Other researchers pointed out, based on the reasons with which the ships are related and the type of naval architecture of ships made of bundles of braided plant stems along with the presence of bipod or tripod masts, that the entire complex should be assigned to Prehistory., whether the Copper or Bronze Age.
The most systematic study carried out to date, carried out by a team from the University of Granada, has applied different Archaeometry procedures: 3D scanning of the shelter, image processing using DStretch reflectance analysis fiber optic pigments and absolute dating (Carbon-14 and thermoluminescence). All of this has allowed us to obtain a series of conclusions that point to the greater age of the representations. Thus, a relative dating has been offered indicating that the boats are the central figures and, therefore, the first to be executed. Furthermore, three oculated motifs appear significantly around the boats that are linked to the Neolithic and Copper Age of the Iberian Peninsula. On the other hand, the pigments of the vessels and said eyepieces are coincident. Finally, two absolute dates have been released. The first is a date obtained on a microsample of black pigment superimposed on another red pigment. The second is a date obtained by thermoluminescence on a ceramic from the most recent occupation level of the shelter. The two dates are coherent with each other, placing the symbolic use of the cavity between the IV and III millennium cal. to. C. From the above, it can be stated that Laja Alta is the oldest representation of sail-powered vessels in the Mediterranean.