Aveline's Hole is a cave at

Burrington Combe Burrington Combe is a Carboniferous Limestone Canyon, gorge near the village of Burrington, Somerset, Burrington, on the north side of the Mendip Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, in North Somerset, England. "Combe" or "coombe" is a wo ...

in the limestone of the

Mendip Hills The Mendip Hills (commonly called the Mendips) is a range of limestone hills to the south of Bristol and Bath, Somerset, Bath in Somerset, England. Running from Weston-super-Mare and the Bristol Channel in the west to the River Frome, Somerset ...

, in

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

. The earliest scientifically dated cemetery in

Britain Britain most often refers to: * Great Britain, a large island comprising the countries of England, Scotland and Wales * The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, a sovereign state in Europe comprising Great Britain and the north-eas ...

, 10,200 and 10,400 years old, was found at Aveline's Hole, constituting the largest assemblage of

Mesolithic The Mesolithic (Ancient Greek language, Greek: μέσος, ''mesos'' 'middle' + λίθος, ''lithos'' 'stone') or Middle Stone Age is the Old World archaeological period between the Upper Paleolithic and the Neolithic. The term Epipaleolithic i ...

human remains found in Britain. Much of the collection has been lost due to pillaging, poorly recorded investigation and

war War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...

, and although more than fifty individuals are represented, there are only two complete skeletons. Perforated animal teeth,

red ochre Ochre ( ; , ), iron ochre, or ocher in American English, is a natural clay earth pigment, a mixture of ferric oxide and varying amounts of clay and sand. It ranges in colour from yellow to deep orange or brown. It is also the name of the col ...

and seven pieces of fossil

ammonite Ammonoids are extinct, (typically) coiled-shelled cephalopods comprising the subclass Ammonoidea. They are more closely related to living octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish (which comprise the clade Coleoidea) than they are to nautiluses (family N ...

, suggest that some of the bodies were adorned. The cave was rediscovered in 1797 by two men digging for a

rabbit Rabbits are small mammals in the family Leporidae (which also includes the hares), which is in the order Lagomorpha (which also includes pikas). They are familiar throughout the world as a small herbivore, a prey animal, a domesticated ...

. The cave was excavated and the entrance enlarged in 1860 by William Boyd Dawkins who named it after his mentor William Talbot Aveline. Access to the cave is controlled by the University of Bristol Spelæological Society and is restricted during the

bat Bats are flying mammals of the order Chiroptera (). With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most birds, flying with their very long spread-out ...

hibernation season.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Caves of the Mendip Hills Limestone caves Scheduled monuments in North Somerset Archaeological sites in Somerset Cemeteries in Somerset

See also

References

External links