Life in the Ice Age. Live at Library!
Elle Clifford began by talking about herbackground as a university lecturer in social psychology which took an unusual turn into archaeology and prehistory some years ago. Since then, she has been privileged to visit over fifty of the best decorated caves in Europe. She has found that children, especially, are fascinated by the Stone Age, and ask her amazing questions about what life was like for our ancestors who lived so long ago. She wanted to portray them as humans just like us, with jobs to do and mouths to feed. Their personalities and behaviour would be as varied as our own, and during the last Ice Age they had major problems to cope with, especially climate change.
https://youtu.be/FUwkNn28QA8?si=JwV7XwDqn9JX-qOc
Elle explained that there have been several Ice Ages and that the ice cap in the north would vary its reach depending on warm currents in the seas and oceans. Habitation would be found on the edges of the polar ice cap where there would be vegetation, water, fish and animals. Exploring the decorated caves had an enormous impact on Elle, not only in the amazing drawings which she saw but the difficulty of access to some of the caves. As a modern-day explorer, she had protective gear and torchlight, but she wants her readers to image what it must have been like for people of the Ice Age in total darkness. The unknown would have been far more intimidating for people of long ago that it is for today’s explorers.
Ice Age families would live in caves, not deep into the cave but just in the opening to provide shelter but open enough to allow for lighting fires to cook and be warm. Their clothes and shoes would have been made from animal skins. Evidence of tents made from Mammoth bones and animal skins have also been found.
Elle’s exploration of caves in Nerja and Pileta provided her with ideas for her book, The Telos. The vastness of Nerja cave is breathtaking, with its huge galleries festooned with stalactites and stalagmites that have formed over millions of years. It must have appeared magical to our ancestors. Deep inside the cave it’s always dark – unless dimly lit by torches or small fires. Nerja has a very inaccessible place called the ‘sanctuary. This is central to the story.
La Pileta cave is located in the mountains. It is a labyrinth of narrow passageways, twisting and turning as if made by a giant serpent. Beyond its internal lake is ‘the chamber of the fish’ where, on the wall, there is a painting of a huge fish. This image is not hidden away like the one in Nerja, and one can easily imagine the artist or a storyteller explaining its powerful meaning to whoever was allowed to see it.
At the beginning of the Telos, we meet a boy who feels different and misunderstood; he finds friendships tedious, preferring to pursue his own interests, and the companionship of his wolf. He resists authority and never puts others’ needs before his own. Kurisan looks at the world differently to others; he sees a pattern of life in the natural world. He challenges the clan’s myths and supernatural beliefs, but the elders fear that the disruption his behaviour causes will lead to chaos.
Kurisan persuades another boy to return to Ur cave after the Gathering — on the pretext of looking for bear bones. While they explore, a heavy rain-storm causes the cave’s passageways to flood and the boys nearly drown. They argue and become separated. Luka escapes to get help, but Kurisan crawls deeper into the cave and finds footprints and a long-forgotten sanctuary with strange paintings of fish. When he attempts to leave the ‘sanctuary’ he falls and becomes trapped.
After he is rescued, he tells the elders what he found. They had no knowledge of the sanctuary’s existence.
When old Ma, the clan matriarch, shows young Iya her amulet, it stirs her childhood memories of a time when women were not just confined to the hearth and raising children. The carved images on the amulet tell of a different myth to their clan’s origin story. The elders realise something is wrong with their beliefs, and the many rituals that have been passed down to them. They are unsure what to do. The women are still not told the truth about the discovery in Ur cave, but whisperings and strange disruptions cause them to challenge the men’s authority.
Old Ma remembers Tarak – an animal spirit-master who is old enough to recollect the ‘time before.’ Two of the elders set out on a difficult journey to see if he is alive and can help them; Kurisan travels with them. They encounter Tarak and his clan on the edge of survival in an isolated and uninviting cave in the mountains. They learn a very different ‘Beginning’ story. Tarak shows Kurisan a painting that helps him understand the relevance of what he found in the sanctuary in Ur cave. In his vision quest, Tarak reveals even more: that Kurisan must make another journey, to the land of ‘the bear, the wolf and the eagle,’ where he will discover what has happened to the fish. Tarak tells Kurisan he will learn a great deal on his journey which will help him save many clans from the natural disasters that a changing climate will bring. But can his life-changing experiences transform him from a self-centred boy to someone committed to helping others? He accepts that this is his telos – his purpose.
Kurisan has discovered the truth — in ‘the time before,’ women were the clan elders. Women are now determined to regain their power and make decisions about the clan’s future; end the dangerous initiation ritual that boys have to endure; and allow their young to decide for themselves many aspects of their lives. However, Kurisan has to accept that his people still need stories that help them understand the meaning of life. Finally, he leaves his home with his wolf, Ochi. Overnight in a rock shelter, his dream reveals what is happening to the rivers and where he will find the fish.
The themes explored in the Telos have resonance with the issues that are being grappled with today. Climate change, and the resistance to changing beliefs despite the realisation that it’s necessary. The roles of men and women, and the division of labour – very relevant today, as in many parts of the world men and women’s rights are being eroded. If democracy is undervalued and not protected, what we take for granted can easily be lost.
This was a wonderful and informative conversation about romance, magic, creating supernatural worlds and the inspiration behind two very different Romantasy stories.
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