Hautes-Pyrénées A few kilometres from the Saint-Bertrand-de-Comminges basilica, Gargas is famous for its walls, decorated with enigmatic paintings of hands. There are nearly 250 hands of children and adults with one or more fingers missing... The painting technique, used in numerous caves, consisted of placing the hand on the wall and blowing black, red, white or yellow pigments around it. The contour could then be drawn in. The black or red hands at Gargas are between 15,000 and 30,000 years old. Carbon 14 dating puts one of them at about 27,000 years old.

Were the missing fingers really missing or simply bent under the palm? Do they represent a kind of code? Ritual mutilation? Or the symptoms of an illness? The mystery remains... But splinters of bones have been found in cracks in the rock, near certain handprints. Next to the hands there are engravings of reindeer, antilopes, bisons and horses. The cave is of geological interest too, offering a succession of chambers with mineral layers and patterns, multiple concretions, draperies, stalactites, columns and stacks...

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