Post by leslie on Sept 5, 2007 9:14:18 GMT -7
CRESSWELL CRAGS.
Cresswell Crags is an area about 15 miles from my home and is a limestone gorge carved out by the receding ice sheets about 200,000 years ago leaving behind the deep gorge pitted with caves. About 120,000 years ago when the climate was warmer, hippopotamus, lion, bison, hyena and red deer live in the area. Between about 90,000 and 70,000 years ago, the climate cooled down considerably but the animal population of mammoth, reindeer bison, horse hyena, woolly rhinoceros, giant deer, wolf and brown bear lived here.
About 50,000 years ago Neanderthals arrived in the gorge and started camping in the caves and hunting the animals, particularly reindeer. 5 major caves are spread around the gorge which now contains a lake (man-made) fed by a river that enters and leaves the lake. It is a magnificent feeling walking round the gorge with the limestone cliffs towering above you. Unfortunately there is only party access to these major caves as archaeological digs are still continuing finding fossils and cave paintings.
About 30,000 years ago when Homo Sapiens had arrived in Europe, early modern humans started to use the caves in the summers to go hunting and eventually the Neanderthals had to give way.
The names of the caves do not reflect their uses, simply artificial names given to them when Cresswell Crags started to be explored.
If you want to see the photographs (all titled) from my visits to the Gorge, go to
community.webshots.com/user/ellray100
You will find my album there – Cresswell Crags Composite Album.
Leslie - the Stone Age Man
Cresswell Crags is an area about 15 miles from my home and is a limestone gorge carved out by the receding ice sheets about 200,000 years ago leaving behind the deep gorge pitted with caves. About 120,000 years ago when the climate was warmer, hippopotamus, lion, bison, hyena and red deer live in the area. Between about 90,000 and 70,000 years ago, the climate cooled down considerably but the animal population of mammoth, reindeer bison, horse hyena, woolly rhinoceros, giant deer, wolf and brown bear lived here.
About 50,000 years ago Neanderthals arrived in the gorge and started camping in the caves and hunting the animals, particularly reindeer. 5 major caves are spread around the gorge which now contains a lake (man-made) fed by a river that enters and leaves the lake. It is a magnificent feeling walking round the gorge with the limestone cliffs towering above you. Unfortunately there is only party access to these major caves as archaeological digs are still continuing finding fossils and cave paintings.
About 30,000 years ago when Homo Sapiens had arrived in Europe, early modern humans started to use the caves in the summers to go hunting and eventually the Neanderthals had to give way.
The names of the caves do not reflect their uses, simply artificial names given to them when Cresswell Crags started to be explored.
If you want to see the photographs (all titled) from my visits to the Gorge, go to
community.webshots.com/user/ellray100
You will find my album there – Cresswell Crags Composite Album.
Leslie - the Stone Age Man