From about 18,000 B.C. Until 10,000 B.C.,
long before Stonehenge and the Pyramids,
back when mammoths and saber-toothed cats
still roamed the earth,
prehistoric people painted
deep inside caves in this part of Europe.
These weren't just crude doodles,
but huge and sophisticated projects
executed by artists
and supported by an impressive culture --
the Magdalenians.
The region's limestone cliffs,
honeycombed with painted caves,
are unique on this planet.
Tourists gather nearby at Lascaux,
home of the region's -- and the world's --
most famous cave paintings.
These caves were discovered accidentally in 1940
by four kids and their dog.
Over the next couple of decades,
about a million visitors climbed through
the prehistoric wonderland, inadvertently
tracking in fungus on their shoes
and changing the humidity and the temperature
with their breathing.
In just 15 years, the precious art
deteriorated more
than in the 15,000 years before that.
The caves were closed to the public.
Visitors can now experience the wonder of Lascaux
by touring an adjacent replica.
When their time comes, visitors are called
to meet their guide for a look
at the precisely copied cave
called Lascaux II.
Man: Then we are in the oxen room --
the most spectacular room of Lascaux.
It's a sacred place.
We don't live in a church.
They never lived in the caves.
And it's a huge composition.
It's a calculated composition,
because they have taken advantage
of the strip of rock
to relate in a circle
two groups of bulls
facing each other.
And in the center of this composition,
they have united
the three principal animals of Lascaux --
horse, ox, and deer.
Steves: Is this a hunting scene?
No, it's not a hunting scene,
because on the walls,
the hunter doesn't exist.
They never tell the everyday life.
The meaning is more complex.
What is the biggest animal?
It's this bull.
He's the largest painting
in the cave art.
16 feet from the top of the horn
to the tip of the tail.
Steves: The guide explains
that this 600-animal, multi-cave composition
was the work of a complex society,
the Magdalenians.
Their culture allowed for skilled artists
to work over an extended period of time
in this sacred place.
Guide: They fix, maybe, on the walls,
a dream, a myth,
on the ledge, and the image will be able
to cross generations.
The image becomes the memory of the society.
The art of Lascaux is supposed to be
around 17,000 years old.
But compared to the beginning of the humanity,
which was born in Africa 3 million years ago,
Lascaux, it was yesterday.
They were like us.
Steves: The region has many more examples
of prehistoric cave painting.
And the nearby National Museum of Prehistory
provides an instructive background.
This modern museum houses over 18,000 bones,
stones, and fascinating little doodads,
all uncovered locally.
Artifacts are originals,
and show that, while the Magdalenian people
lived 15,000 years ago, they were far more advanced
than your textbook cavemen.
Skeletons were discovered draped in delicate jewelry.
Stag teeth and tiny shells were, it seems,
lovingly drilled to be strung
into necklaces.
These barbed spearheads and fishhooks
would work well today.
Finely carved spear throwers show impressive realism
for something three times as old
as the oldest pyramids.
Imagine flickering flames
from these oil lamps
lighting those art-covered caverns.
Today, as we ponder the prehistoric caves
and the artifacts of the magdalenian people
here in the Dordogne, we can marvel
at how much we actually have in common with these people
and how sophisticated their culture was, so long ago.