According to Asociación RUVID researchers have identified the raw material of the black pigments used in the shelters of the Remigia cave in the Iberian Mediterranean Basin. This study of Levantine rock art by an international team of researchers in the shelters of the Remigia cave, in the Valltorta-Gassulla area, between the Valencian regions of L'Alt Maestrat and La Plana (Castello), has also analysed the techniques used to prepare the pigments, throwing light on the associated cultural patterns.

Analysis of the cave paintings in the Remigia cave (Asociación RUVID)

The importance of Levantine rock art - with over 700 sites - was recognized by UNESCO World Heritage status in 1998, but the authorship and dating of this form of art found in the Iberian Mediterranean basin is still open to debate. According to UNESCO, the oldest rock art is dated roughly to 8,000 BC and the most recent to about 3,500 BC. The art therefore spans a period of cultural change, from primarily Mesolithic hunter-gatherer societies to Neolithic farming societies.

Most representations in Levantine art use a red pigment obtained from iron oxide, whilst other colours such as black and white were thought to have used only occasionally. The latest research, however, presents a new set of figures, depicting humans and animals, in black, unnoticed in previous investigations. Analysis reveals the use of carbonised plant material to produce the black pigments used in the Levantine paintings at Valltorta-Gassulla. This would allow carbon-14 dating.

To determine the elemental composition of the black pigments, two types of analyses were used by the research team, according to Asociación RUVID: firstly, the energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence (EDXRF), a non-destructive analysis made on site; and secondly, electron microscopy, a laboratory analysis of micro-samples from a limited set of black figures.