Gisement préhistorique de la Ferrassie
MonumentHidden Treasure
Gisement préhistorique de la Ferrassie, located in Savignac-de-Miremont (Dordogne), is a historic monument. The monument is currently closed to visitors.
Key facts
- Type
- autre
- Location
- Savignac-de-Miremont, Dordogne, Nouvelle-Aquitaine
- Visit
- Closed to visitors
- GPS
- 44.9517, 0.9381
- Mérimée Reference
- PA00082992
Sanctuary of primitive humanity, the La Ferrassie rock shelter has been yielding unique Neanderthal remains since 1896: engraved burials, bones and Mousterian tools revealing the earliest known funerary rituals.
History
Nestling in a wooded valley in the Vézère valley, the La Ferrassie rock shelter is one of the richest and most moving prehistoric sites in the Périgord region. Carved naturally into the limestone cliffs, this twenty-metre-deep shelter was home to communities of Neanderthals between 70,000 and 40,000 years ago, whose burial practices have revolutionised our understanding of human prehistory. What radically distinguishes La Ferrassie from the multitude of other Palaeolithic sites in the region is the density and exceptional quality of its finds. Eight Neanderthal individuals were found there - men, women and young children - arranged in deliberate orientations and accompanied by lithic offerings. These intentional burials, some of the oldest documented in France, attest to the inner life and symbolic behaviour of a species long reduced to a purely bestial status by the collective imagination. For informed visitors, the experience at La Ferrassie is above all a sensory and intellectual one: the ochre chalk cliff overlooks a carpet of dense foliage, and the cool, damp atmosphere of the shelter is an inescapable reminder of the conditions in which these Mousterian and Chatelperronian men lived. Beneath the limestone wall, the visible strata still reveal the meticulous superimposition of several prehistoric cultures, a veritable stone book of 30,000 years of human occupation. The natural setting of Savignac-de-Miremont extends the experience: the Périgord Noir, with its oak forests and secret valleys, offers an unspoilt setting that puts into perspective the continuity of human settlement in this region over dozens of millennia. La Ferrassie is one of a constellation of major sites - Les Eyzies, Laugerie-Haute, Le Moustier - that make the Vézère valley a unique area in the world for the study of the Palaeolithic.
Architecture
The La Ferrassie shelter is part of the characteristic geology of the Périgord Noir: a slightly overhanging cliff of coniacian limestone, whose differential erosion over the millennia has created a horizontal cavity open onto the hillside. Around 25 metres long and 8 to 12 metres deep depending on the area, the shelter offered a significant living space, protected from the elements and facing south-east, exposed to the rays of the rising sun - an orientation found in many Palaeolithic settlement sites in the region, suggesting a deliberate selection on the part of human groups. The limestone wall varies in colour from creamy white to rusty ochre, depending on humidity and the concentration of iron oxides. The relatively soft rock facilitated the accumulation of sediment at the foot of the cliff: excavations revealed a stratigraphy several metres thick in places, made up of alternating layers of clayey silt, hearth ash, carved flint and faunal bones. The various layers, numbered I to VIII by Peyrony, constitute an exceptionally dense geological and cultural archive. The floor of the shelter, which slopes slightly outwards, facilitates the natural drainage of rainwater. The microarchitecture of the Neanderthal burials, with their pits dug directly into the sediment and sometimes demarcated by rough limestone blocks, bears witness to an organisation of the interior space that prefigures, in its intentions, the funerary practices of all later human cultures.
Related Figures
Louis Capitan — médecin et préhistorien, co-directeur des premières fouilles systématiques à partir de 1905Denis Peyrony — instituteur et archéologue périgourdin, figure centrale des découvertes de 1909-1921 et fondateur du Musée des EyziesLa Ferrassie 1 — individu néandertalien masculin, l'un des squelettes les plus complets de cette espèce jamais retrouvés en FranceHarold Dibble — préhistorien américain (University of Pennsylvania) ayant dirigé les fouilles modernes des années 1980-2000Alain Turq — conservateur au Musée national de Préhistoire des Eyzies, spécialiste du Moustérien périgourdin ayant contribué à la réévaluation du siteAntoine Dujardin — propriétaire terrien local ayant autorisé les premières fouilles sur ses parcelles au début du XXe siècle
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Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Gisement préhistorique de la Ferrassie located?
Gisement préhistorique de la Ferrassie is located in Savignac-de-Miremont, Dordogne department, Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, France.
Is Gisement préhistorique de la Ferrassie open to visitors?
Gisement préhistorique de la Ferrassie is currently closed to visitors.