Bordeaux and Palmiers

For the camp in Paziols, we center our cultural lessons on three main categories: the Middle Ages, with the châteaux, the garrigue, with the country festivals, and prehistory, with the Centre Européen de la Préhistoire à Tautavel.

The Centre is made up of two museums in the town of Tautavel, which is directly below the Caune de l’Arago, where the first European specimen of hominid was found.

The museums explore the history of man’s evolution: the first is devoted primarily to Homo erectus, the predecessor of Homo sapiens, and to specimens of rocks, bones and tools that were found at sites worldwide. The second museum is devoted to the site of the Caune de l’Arago, with a complete reconstruction of the inside of the cave, as well as a reconstruction of what the skeleton of the Caune de l’Arago would have looked like, considering the bones that were found.

Outside the museum is a demonstration of how men made fire throughout history, which was an excellent predecessor for the evening film that followed our visit to the museum: La Guerre du Feu. La Guerre du Feu is a French film about the first men in Europe and “the war” of fire: how fire was first domesticated by early societies of men. The combination of the almost clinical orderliness of the museum with the gritty reality of the film was an incredible experience. The fact that we had seen the Caune earlier that day made the film seem all the more real and true.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS