Maros-Pangkep Karst

One Of The Largest Karst Regions On Earth, And The Caves In It Hold Figurative Paintings Dated To Around Forty Five Thousand Years Among The Oldest Known Anywhere · Maros, South Sulawesi

For most of the twentieth century the story of figurative art began in EUROPE, at LASCAUX and CHAUVET, and everything else was assumed to be later and derivative. THEN THE CAVES IN THESE LIMESTONE TOWERS WERE DATED. HAND STENCILS AND ANIMAL FIGURES IN THE MAROS-PANGKEP KARST CAME BACK AT ROUGHLY FORTY-FIVE THOUSAND YEARS - a warty pig at one site, hands at many - WHICH PUTS THEM AMONG THE OLDEST KNOWN FIGURATIVE IMAGES ON EARTH AND AS OLD AS OR OLDER THAN ANYTHING IN EUROPE. The assumption did not survive it. What you actually visit is two things: LEANG-LEANG and the other accessible cave sites, where stencils sit under overhangs, and RAMMANG-RAMMANG, where a small boat takes you up a green river between limestone towers to a village in a bowl of rock. One is deep time and one is a beautiful hour on the water, and they are forty minutes from Makassar. The most significant painted caves are closed to visitors and should stay closed - the pigment is measurably deteriorating - and what is open is more than enough to stand in front of and reconsider what you were taught.

Maros-Pangkep Karst, Maros and Pangkep, South Sulawesi, Maros, South Sulawesi, Indonesia

IT IS ROUGHLY AN HOUR FROM MAKASSAR, and the two halves are separate trips with separate gates. RAMMANG-RAMMANG IS ENTERED FROM A JETTY AT SALENRANG, where SMALL BOATS ARE HIRED AND SHARED and run up the river through the towers - a fixed boat price split among passengers, and it is cheap. LEANG-LEANG has a park entrance and daytime hours. THE MOST SIGNIFICANT PAINTED CAVES ARE NOT OPEN TO CASUAL VISITORS AND SHOULD NOT BE - some are research sites under active conservation and the pigment is deteriorating measurably. WHAT IS OPEN IS ENOUGH. Mornings are cooler and the light on the river is better. This is a WET REGION with rain in most months. Combine with Bantimurung's waterfall and butterflies, which is adjacent and is what most Indonesian visitors come for.

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