French President Francois Hollande visits Lascaux 4, a new replica of the prehistoric paintings of the Lascaux cave, in Montignac, on December 10, 2016. Regis Duvignau/AFP/Getty Images.

The Lascaux cave paintings were accidentally discovered by four teenagers on this day in 1940. Marcel Ravidat, Jacques Marsal, Georges Agnel, and Simon Coencas stumbled upon the entrance to the ...

PARIS, June 24 (Reuters) - Nearly six decades after France's prehistoric Lascaux caves were made off-limits, visitors will be once again be able to tour the site - only this time in virtual reality.

Designed by Mateo Arquitectura, the proposal for the Lascaux IV: International Cave Painting Center competition speaks to us of its history and woven of enigmas that humankind seeks to solve.It ...

Biocides used in recent years to treat the growth of a black fungus on the cave-art-festooned walls of France’s Lascaux cave have eradicated some populations of human-introduced bacteria and ...

If you enter Lascaux into the GPS, the computer will plot a complicated route to a blip of a farming community elbow-deep in the hilly boonies. It’s miles from the cave – as well as anything else.

Lascaux was discovered in 1940, but closed to the public in 1963 after visitors' breath was found to be affecting the paintings. A mock-up, Lascaux II, attracts 250,000 people a year.

A replica of the main Lascaux cavern was built nearby and has become a big tourist draw. Carbon-dating suggests the murals were created between 15,000 and 17,500 years ago.

The Lascaux cave’s iconic Hall of Bulls details 36 paintings of deer, horses and bulls. (One bull stretches 17 feet). Photograph: Philippe Psaila, courtesy of the Field Museum .