Es-Skhul (es-Skhūl,

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

: מערת סחול; ; meaning ''kid'', ''young goat'') or the Skhul Cave is a

prehistoric Prehistory, also called pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the first known use of stone tools by hominins million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use o ...

cave Caves or caverns are natural voids under the Earth's Planetary surface, surface. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. Exogene caves are smaller openings that extend a relatively short distance undergrou ...

site situated about south of the city of

Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

, and about from the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern Eur ...

. Together with the nearby sites of Tabun Cave, Jamal cave, and the cave at El Wad, Skhul is part of the Nahal Me'arot Nature Reserve, a national park and

UNESCO World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

. The site was first excavated by Dorothy Garrod during summer of 1929. Several human skeletons were found in the cave, belonging to an ancient species of ''

Homo sapiens Humans (''Homo sapiens'') or modern humans are the most common and widespread species of primate, and the last surviving species of the genus ''Homo''. They are Hominidae, great apes characterized by their Prehistory of nakedness and clothing ...

''. Both

Neanderthals Neanderthals ( ; ''Homo neanderthalensis'' or sometimes ''H. sapiens neanderthalensis'') are an extinction, extinct group of archaic humans who inhabited Europe and Western and Central Asia during the Middle Pleistocene, Middle to Late Plei ...

and anatomically modern humans were present in the region from 200,000 to 45,000 years ago. The remains found at es-Skhul, together with those found at the other caves of Wadi el-Mughara and Mugharet el-Zuttiyeh, were classified in 1939 by Arthur Keith and as ''Palaeoanthropus palestinensis'', a descendant of ''

Homo heidelbergensis ''Homo heidelbergensis'' is a species of archaic human from the Middle Pleistocene of Europe and Africa, as well as potentially Asia depending on the taxonomic convention used. The species-level classification of ''Homo'' during the Middle Pleis ...

''.The stone age of Mount Carmel : report of the Joint Expedition of the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem and the American School of Prehistoric Research, 1929–1934
p. 18

References

External links

*
Jewish Virtual Library

Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs
{{World Heritage Sites in Israel and Jerusalem Archaeological sites in Israel Prehistoric sites in Israel Paleoanthropological sites World Heritage Sites in Israel Neanderthal sites Caves of Israel Mount Carmel

See also

References

External links