The Red "Lady" of Paviland is an Upper Paleolithic partial male skeleton dyed in red ochre and buried in Wales 33,000 BP. The bones were discovered in 1823 by William Buckland in an archaeological dig at Goat's Hole Cave which is a limestone cave between Port Eynon and Rhossili on the Gower Peninsula, near Swansea in south Wales. Buckland believed the skeleton was a Roman era female. Later, William Solace examined Goat's Cave Paviland in 1912. There, Solace found flint arrow heads and tools and correctly concluded that the skeleton was in fact a male hunter-gatherer or warrior during the last Ice Age.
The Creswellian is a British Upper Palaeolithic culture named after the type site of Creswell Crags in Derbyshire by Dorothy Garrod in 1926. It is also known as the British Late Magdalenian. According to Andreas Maier: "In current research, the Creswellian and Hamburgian are considered to be independent but closely related entities which are rooted in the Magdalenian." The Creswellian is dated between 13,000 and 11,800 BP and was followed by the most recent ice age, the Younger Dryas, when Britain was at times unoccupied by humans.
The Upper Paleolithic is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago, according to some theories coinciding with the appearance of behavioral modernity in early modern humans, until the advent of the Neolithic Revolution and agriculture.
The Late Pleistocene is an unofficial age in the international geologic timescale in chronostratigraphy, also known as the Upper Pleistocene from a stratigraphic perspective. It is intended to be the fourth division of the Pleistocene Epoch within the ongoing Quaternary Period. It is currently defined as the time between c. 129,000 and c. 11,700 years ago. The late Pleistocene equates to the proposed Tarantian Age of the geologic time scale, preceded by the officially ratified Chibanian. The beginning of the Late Pleistocene is the transition between the end of the Penultimate Glacial Period and the beginning of the Last Interglacial around 130,000 years ago. The Late Pleistocene ends with the termination of the Younger Dryas, some 11,700 years ago when the Holocene Epoch began.
Spy Cave is located in Wallonia near Spy in the municipality of Jemeppe-sur-Sambre, Namur Province, Belgium above the left bank of the Orneau River. Classified as a premier Heritage site of the Walloon Region, the location ranks among the most significant paleolithic sites in Europe. The cave consists of numerous small chambers and corridors.
The Divje Babe flute, also called tidldibab, is a cave bear femur pierced by spaced holes that was unearthed in 1995 during systematic archaeological excavations led by the Institute of Archaeology of the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, at the Divje Babe I near Cerkno in northwestern Slovenia. It has been suggested that it was made by Neanderthals as a form of musical instrument, and became known as the Neanderthal flute. The artifact is on prominent public display in the National Museum of Slovenia in Ljubljana as a Neanderthal flute. As such, it would be the world's oldest known musical instrument.
Peștera cu Oase is a system of 12 karstic galleries and chambers located near the city Anina, in the Caraș-Severin county, southwestern Romania, where some of the oldest European early modern human (EEMH) remains, between 42,000 and 37,000 years old, have been found.
Devil's Lair is a single-chamber cave with a floor area of around 200 m2 (2,200 sq ft) that formed in a Quaternary dune limestone of the Leeuwin–Naturaliste Ridge, 5 km (3.1 mi) from the modern coastline of Western Australia. The stratigraphic sequence in the cave floor deposit consists of 660 cm (260 in) of sandy sediments, with more than 100 distinct layers, intercalated with flowstone and other indurated deposits. Excavations have been made in several areas of the cave floor. Since 1973, excavations have been concentrated in the middle of the cave, where 10 trenches have been dug. Archaeological evidence for intermittent human occupation extends down about 350 cm (140 in) to layer 30, with hearths, bone, and stone artefacts found throughout. The site provides evidence of human habitation of Southwest Australia 50,000 years before the present day.
Azykh Cave, also referred to as Azokh Cave, is a six-cave complex in Azerbaijan, known as a habitation site of prehistoric humans. It is situated near the village of Azykh in the Khojavend District. The cave is an important prehistoric site which has been occupied by different human groups for a long time. The ancient layers of the Middle Paleolithic have yielded Neanderthal fossil remains that may date from around 300,000 years ago.
Cathole Cave, Cat Hole Cave or Cathole Rock Cave, is a cave near Parc Cwm long cairn at Parc le Breos, on the Gower Peninsula, Wales. It is a steep limestone outcrop, about 200 yards (180 m) north of the cromlech along the Parc le Breos Cwm valley and near the top of the gorge, about 50 feet (15 m) from the valley floor. The cave is a deep triangular fissure penetrating the hillside and narrowing towards the top. It has two entrances, with a natural platform outside the larger of the two. It is about seven 1⁄2 miles (12 km) west south–west of Swansea, Wales, in what is now known as Coed y Parc Cwm at Parc le Breos, on the Gower Peninsula.
The Kents Cavern 4 maxilla is a human fossil consisting of a right canine, third premolar, and first molar as well as the bone holding them together including a small piece of palate. The fossil was found in 1927 at Kents Cavern, a limestone cave in Torquay, Devon, England. The maxilla was uncovered at a depth of 10 feet 6 inches (3.20 m) and was located directly beneath a key ‘granular stalagmite’ at the site, which was used as a datum during excavations undertaken between 1926 and 1941 by the Torquay Natural History Society. The discovery of the KC4 maxilla was important because it became the earliest direct dated anatomically modern human (AMH) fossil yet discovered from a northwestern European site. Moreover the date obtained via a Bayesian statistical-modelling method provides evidence for the coexistence of anatomically modern humans and Neanderthals.
The Mladečské Caves are a cave complex in the municipality of Mladeč in the Czech Republic. It is located in the Třesín National Nature Monument within the Litovelské Pomoraví Protected Landscape Area.
Dewil Valley, located in the northernmost part of Palawan, an island province of the Philippines that is located in the Mimaropa region, is an archaeological site composed of thousands of artifacts and features. According to the University of the Philippines Archaeological Studies Program, or UP-ASP, the closest settlement can be found in New Ibajay, which is covered by the town capital of El Nido, which is located around 9 km (5.6 mi) south-east of Dewil Valley. Physically it measures around 7 km (4.3 mi) long, and 4 km (2.5 mi) wide. It is in this place which the Ille Cave, one of the main archaeological sites, can be found. It is actually a network of 3 cave mouths located at its base. It has been discovered that this site in particular has been used and occupied by humans over multiple time periods.
Taforalt, or Grotte des Pigeons, is a cave in the province of Berkane, Aït Iznasen region, Morocco, possibly the oldest cemetery in North Africa. It contained at least 34 Iberomaurusian adolescent and adult human skeletons, as well as younger ones, from the Upper Palaeolithic between 15,100 and 14,000 calendar years ago. There is archaeological evidence for Iberomaurusian occupation at the site between 23,200 and 12,600 calendar years ago, as well as evidence for Aterian occupation as old as 85,000 years.
Theopetra Cave is a limestone cave located in Theopetra village of Meteora municipality, Thessaly, Greece. It is situated on the northeast side of a limestone rock formation that is 3 km (2 mi) south of Kalambaka. The site has become increasingly important as human presence is attributed to all periods of the Middle and Upper Paleolithic, the Mesolithic, Neolithic and beyond, bridging the Pleistocene with the Holocene.
Le Regourdou is an archaeological site in the Dordogne department, France, on top of a hill just 800 m (2,600 ft) from the famous cave complex of Lascaux. At this now collapsed 35 m (115 ft) deep ancient karst cavity remarkably well preserved Neanderthal fossils were recovered, that might be skeletal remains of deliberate burials. According to the current excavation team at the site, the correct name of the location is "Regourdou". "Le Régourdou" is considered a misnomer and should be avoided.
The Caves of Kesh, also known as the Keash Caves or the Caves of Keshcorran, are a series of limestone caves located near the village of Keash, County Sligo, Ireland. The caves are situated on the west side of Keshcorran Hill and consist of sixteen simple chambers, some interconnecting.
Marion Dowd is an archaeologist. She is best known for her book, The Archaeology of Caves in Ireland which won Book of the Year at the 2016 Archaeology Awards.
Romuald’s Cave is a cave in the western part of Istria County, Croatia, that contains the oldest known cave paintings in southeast Europe, as well as traces of both animal and human Upper Paleolithic habitation. Although the cave has been excavated since late 19th century, the paintings were only found in 2010, by Professor Darko Komšo, while the findings were published in Antiquity in 2019.
The Butovo culture was a post-glacial Mesolithic culture in the Upper Volga region of Russia in the catchment areas of the Volga and Oka rivers, 9600-6000 BC. The culture was formed by groups that developed from the Swiderian culture, which migrated to the region from the south as the climate warmed after the Ice Age. The Butovo culture is divided into the Early, Middle and Late phases. It has also been suggested that the Butovo culture began in the Younger Dryas period before 10100 BC.
