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The first
documented news that we have about the Otero cave dates
of 1908, when Lorenzo Sierra, in his "Apuntes
para el mapa paletnologico de la provincia de Santander"
(Notes for the paletnologic map of the province of
Santander) talks about the presence of an important
Magdalenien deposit in this cavity. In the 60s, Gonzįlez
Echegaray, Garcia Guinea and Begines Ramirez realized a
complete study of this deposit, in which they stablished
a stratigraphic sequence with levels of the Aurignacien,
final and upper Magdalenien and Azilienien. Although this cave has been visited by
specialists since the beginning of the century, it is not
until 1983 when the parietal decorations were located. It
is a small panel composed of the figure of a goat in frontal
vision (to the left) and a string of nonfigurative lines
situated in a gallery with a very low ceiling. The
employed technique in this panel is the engraving with a
lonely very thin trace. The inclination towards the left
that presents the figure of the goat and the
nonfigurative lines plus the scarce height of the ceiling
in the gallery (aproximately 1 meter) make you think that
the collection was worked in the same session and just by
one person, possibly lying on his left side, and drawing
with his right hand.
The representation of animals in
frontal perspective is rare in the Cantabrian rock art,
having been documented some similar examples in the Ekain
cave (Guipśzcoa) and La Lastrilla cave (Cantabria),
though they were painted in black and red respectively.
In France, frontal representations of goat are known in
the Massat cave (Aričge, Midi-Pirenčes). On the other
hand, in the mobiliar art, we find a lot of pieces with
this motif. Most of them have been in levels of the
suerior-final Magdalenien, this made it possible to set
the panel of Otero cave in this period.
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