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From This Is Bristol
10,000 YEAR OLD CAVE ART FOUND
BY IAN TURNER I.TURNER
11:00 - 08 February 2005
Cave art which may be at least 10,000 years old has been discovered in North Somerset. Experts from Bristol University have unearthed an engraving in a cave in Burrington Combe, near Langford.
Graham Mullan and Linda Wilson, members of the university's speleological society, have spent much of the last 10 years studying palaeolithic cave art. The academics found the engravings as part of a comprehensive search of caves in southern Britain.
The first results of this inquiry are a series of inscribed crosses found on the wall of Aveline's Hole, in Burrington Combe, which is famous as being the site of the earliest known cemetery in the British Isles.
Recent studies have shown that it was intensively used for burials shortly after the end of the last Ice Age.
Abstract designs such as those found are commonly discovered in mesolithic settings but some date back to the upper palaeolithic cultures of the last Ice Age.
However, studies assisted by Bristol University rock art specialist Dr George Nash and experts from the British Museum show that this engraving is more likely to date from after the Ice Age.
Jill Cook, deputy keeper in the department of prehistory and Europe at the British Museum, said: "This is an exciting and important discovery.
"The few lines that form this panel are a signature from the period right at the end of the last Ice Age, when the present period of warm climate was beginning.
"The pattern is comparable with others known from Northern France, Germany and Denmark, giving a wider context for the finds of this time and a rare glimpse of what may have been a rather special means of communication."
Mr Mullan and Ms Wilson are continuing their search and believe more works of this type may well come to light in the other Mendips caves used by early man.
A further engraving has been noted in one of the caves in the Cheddar Gorge and further investigations are being carried out to verify this.
A gate has been installed in the cave to protect the engraving after consultations between English Heritage and other interested parties, including the landowner and English Nature.
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