Figures in different styles, mostly schematic, arranged around Levantine figures that must have preceded them; the principal subject appears to be a large bovine.

What is the solar image?

A sun with rays ending in four-fingered hands, linked by the Ministry to agrarian solar cults.

Selva Pascuala (Villar del Humo): the bovine and the solar image

Abrigo de Fuente de Selva Pascuala

Selva Pascuala rock shelter lies in the upper part of the Rambla del Anear, in the Callejones de Potencio, facing south. It has two panels; the principal subject appears to be a large bovine. Around 300 m away, Fuente de Selva Pascuala shelter preserves a solar image with rays ending in four-fingered hands.

A very open rock shelter

Selva Pascuala lies at the head of the Rambla del Anear, in the Callejones de Potencio, facing south towards an open area of around 500 m². It has two panels.

The first, larger panel mixes styles. Schematic figures predominate, painted around older Levantine ones, and a large bovine seems to dominate the centre, although its relationship with the rest is unclear. The second has naturalistic figures that do not follow Levantine conventions: four animals, three of them horses, one beside a human figure, and vertical bars.

The sun of the four hands

Around 300 metres away, the Fuente de Selva Pascuala shelter holds a sun with rays ending in four-fingered hands, linked to solar cults of the first farmers. Nearby is another very faded painting, perhaps another hand or another sun.

Plan your visit

Before you travel

The paintings are fragile: do not touch or wet them.

Combine with

It forms part of the Villar del Humo group, alongside Peña del Escrito and Marmalo.

From the archive

A wall of the Selva Pascuala shelter keeps painted figures.

Paintings in the Selva Pascuala rock shelter, in Villar del Humo. The archive titles it «Boniches» and speaks of «domestication of the horse», an old interpretation. Between 1900 and 1950, according to the archive. Photo: «CUENCA. Boniches. Pintura rupestre. Domesticación del caballo junto a la Casa del Anear», Eduardo Hernández-Pacheco · Archivo fotográfico Hernández-Pacheco, Biblioteca Histórica de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, BH FOT HP 0703 · CC BY 4.0

The figure of a bovine appears on the rock of Selva Pascuala.

The painted bull of Selva Pascuala, beside the Anear farmhouse. The archive places it in Boniches. Between 1900 and 1950, according to the archive. Photo: «CUENCA. Boniches Toro pintado junto a la casa del Enear», Eduardo Hernández-Pacheco · Archivo fotográfico Hernández-Pacheco, Biblioteca Histórica de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, BH FOT HP 0704 · CC BY 4.0

Where it is