Shulgan-Tash Cave

Shulgan-Tash Cave (Bashkir: Шүлгәнташ, romanized: Şölgəntaş, [ʃɵl.ɣæn.ˈtʰɑʂ]), also known as Kapova Cave (Russian: Капова пещера, romanized: Kapova peshchera), is a limestone karst cave in the Burzyansky District of Bashkortostan, Russia. It is located in the southern Ural Mountains, on the Belaya River in the Shulgan-Tash Nature Reserve, approximately 200 km (120 mi) south-east of Ufa.

The cave is best known for the Upper Paleolithic rock paintings and drawings (more than 190, mostly in a precarious state of preservation), including the only known prehistoric painting of a (two-humped) camel. They were added to the World Heritage List in 2025. Approximately 30–50 images are relatively well-preserved. The most famous of them—of mammoths, horses, rhinoceroses, bison, and a camel—are located quite far from the entrance (300 meters and more). These images are made with red ochre, sometimes with outlines in charcoal.

The current estimate for the age of the paintings, based on uranium-thorium dating, places them between approximately 14,500 and 36,400 years old. This range is derived from dating calcite flowstone underlying and overlying the paintings, with the oldest underlying calcite dated to 36.4±0.1 ka (thousand years ago) and the youngest overlying calcite dated to 14.5±0.04 ka. Radiocarbon dates from cultural layers in the cave suggest a narrower range of about 16,300 to 19,600 years ago.

The discovery of the Shulgan-Tash paintings in 1959 was significant because it extended the known range of Paleolithic cave painting outside Western Europe, challenging the long-held idea that such art was exclusive to Spain and France. The Serpievka group of caves (about 250 km from Shulgan-Tash) is the only one that contains ancient paintings to the north of Shulgan-Tash.