Karen Armstrong, In her book, The Case For God, opens with the discussion of the 300 plus caves in Southern France and Northern Spain which have amazingly artistic ‘prehistoric’ cave paintings of prehistoric animals many of whom are now extinct, some dating to 30,000 years ago. “In all there are about six hundred frescoes and fifteen hundred engravings in the Lascaux labyrinth. There is a powerful bellowing black stag, a leaping cow, and a procession of horses moving in the opposite direction. At the entrance to another long passage known as the Nave, a frieze of elegant deer has been painted above a rocky ledge so they appear to be swimming.” (p3-4) She emphasizes that back then, the “Paleolithic artists” worked by the “light of small flickering lamps, perched precariously on scaffolding that has left holes in the surface of the wall.” (p.4)
Armstrong highlights a painting that appears to be a painting of a shaman which is very deep in a cave at Lascaux called the Crypt, and which “depicts a large bison that has been eviscerated by a spear thrust through its hindquarters. Lying in front of the wounded beast is a man, drawn with arms outstretched, phallus erect, and wearing what seems to be a bird mask; his staff, which lies on the ground nearby, is also topped by a bird’s head.” (p. 5)