The Red Lady of El Mirón was buried behind an engraved rock, then her skull and long bones were taken away and the rest re-painted red

In 2010 the El Mirón cave team led by Lawrence Straus and Manuel González Morales looked into a gap about a metre wide between the cave wall and a large fallen block. They found most of a woman's skeleton. She died about 18,700 years ago, aged 35 to 40, robust and healthy, eating ibex, red deer, salmon and mushrooms. Her bones were coated in red ochre that sparkles with hematite crystals and came from an outcrop more than 20 kilometres away. The block's outer face is engraved with a multi-line V that may represent a pubic triangle, cut about the time of the burial; the face against her body was stained red. A wolf or dog gnawed her shin soon after burial. Later her skull and all long bones except the shin were removed, and the jaw and remaining bones were re-stained with ochre and left. Pollen of small yellow flowers may mark flowers placed in the grave. Magdalenians rarely buried their dead, and she is the first substantial Magdalenian skeleton found in Iberia. Straus said she "was given special treatment," and the team does not know why. Where her skull went is unknown.