Hunter-gatherer life is not just about survival, there is a great deal of spare time to fill up. Dancing, making music and musical instruments, decoration (jewellery, braids etc.), designing and making clothing, telling stories, active sports and games and a range of other leisure activities serve to make life enjoyable. Here we are going to show you how to make paint for your next cave-painting.

Our ancestors made paint from ochres – that means haematite (You can use rust from iron or steel –there’s plenty of both about).

When crumbled a yellow, orange, red or deep red ochre can be made. Ochre can also be found at springs and sometimes in streams. Grind your ochre(s) into as fine a dust as you need. Any ochre you have can probably be changed to a second colour by heating, for instance yellow heated to orange or red to deep red.

You may also want black: coal, charcoal, graphite or burnt bones work well. If you want white (Useful for lightening ochres) natural or commercial chalk and crushed shells work. Eventually you can build up the range of colours used by Palaeolithic people. Note that you have no blue or green – no matter – your ancestors mainly painted animals and there has always been a lack of blue and green horses, deer, rhinos and elephants. The colours you have made can last around 30,000 years at least.

Now you will need a medium – that is the stuff that sticks the powder together and to cave walls. In other words, the gloop that turns pigment into paint. Here’s some popular media.

Spit, beeswax, animal fat, tree resin, seed or nut oil, egg white. (A mixture of water and PVA glue works too.)

Now you need to apply it with something, the tip of your finger is good or a brush made from a fibrous wood that has been crushed or even grass stalks pushed into a hollow twig.

Many people talk in reverential tones about the profound ritual nature of the great cave paintings and how access to the caves would have been restricted to the dominant males in command of sacred ritual.

There are some problems with this idea.

Hunter-Gatherers are generally egalitarian – no-one gives orders or tells anyone what to do. If a male tried to be dominant, everyone – especially the women – would make fun of him until he gave up. They also adore their children and let them do what they want.  But what really knocks the dominant ritual male thing is found at Lascaux caves, on one wall all the possibly ‘serious’ paintings are high up, but at a level that children can see is a row of ponies like this…

More sort of cute rather than profoundly spiritual. Could have

been something to do with bedtime stories.

These ponies are very easy to draw – just follow this sequence…

Feel free to copy and adapt any paintings and drawings on this site. You can send us your Artwork for display on this site. Please submit to:

info@palaeoquest.com

Remember to give us your first name and age only and permission to publish the pictures!