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Baume d'Oullins

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Site type:
Cave
Site function:
Habitation site, Decor cave
Lat/Long:
44.34, 4.45
Country:
France
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The Baume d'Oullins or Baume d'Oulen is a prehistoric decorated cave, discovered in 1896 by Dr. Paul Raymond. It is located on the left bank of the gorges of the Ardèche in the communes of Labastide-de-Virac (Ardèche) and Le Garn (Gard).

The cavity which opens facing north by a vast porch (50 m wide by 15 m high) at 220 m altitude is composed of an entrance room with wall engravings and a deeper room discovered after unblocking which includes engravings and cave paintings. The cave is included in the perimeter of the national nature reserve of the Gorges de l'Ardèche and dominates the river by about 160 m.

La Baume d'Oullins was occupied from the Middle Paleolithic to the Neolithic. This is the most important stratigraphy concerning the Upper Paleolithic of the Rhone Valley with the Salpêtrière cave.

The different Paleolithic levels recognized are:

  • the final Mousterian
  • the Gravettian
  • the Solutrean
  • The Magdalenian

Level 10 of Jean Combier's excavations, posterior to the Upper Solutrean, yielded an industry that the researcher named "Rhodanian." In the absence of any other level to confirm the individualization of this horizon, the term remains pending for the moment.

More recent excavations conducted by Frédéric Bazile of the CNRS have made it possible to date different levels, including the Upper Solutrean between 21,000 and 20,000 years BP.