Musée de l'Ours des Cavernes en Chartreuse

An unusual museum opened its doors on the 5th July 2002 in Entremont-le-Vieux (Savoy) in the Chartreuse Mountains: a museum entirely devoted to the Cave Bear. Ursus speleus was one of those rare mammals which seems exclusively European, formerly populating the forests in moderate climates as well as the cold steppe zones. The Cave Bear was an enormous animal, much larger than our current Brown Bears, which only appeared in the last glaciation. It even seems that our ancestors reserved a certain admiration to him if one judges some by the preferential treatment give to the Cave Bear bones discovered in the famous Chauvet Cave or by as depicted in cave paintings. The museum is situated at the foot of the Granier mountain which contains a well-known site called, the Grotte de la Balme à Collomb, which was discovered in 1988 and produced 12 000 bones of the Cave Bear between 1989 and 1994. These date back to 40,000 to 21,000 BC.

The locations of over 2000 Cave Bear underground hibernating quarters are displayed to the visitors in the form of a computer print out. A 3D animated film, describes the life and times of the Cave Bear and is a highlight of the tour.

In September 2003, the Museum will host the 9th International Symposium of the Cave Bear.

Text by Tony Oldham (2003). With kind permission.