AN ARCHAEOLOGIST who is set to lead the excavation of a 350-million year-old bone cave near St Asaph is hopeful that answers about when and how Neanderthals became extinct will be found there.
Ffynnon Beuno, the four-acre smallholding in Tremeirchion, is one of just three sites in Britain to have evidence of both late Neanderthals and Britain’s earliest modern humans.
It was first excavated in 1883 and was found to contain Ice Age flint tools and the bones of woolly rhino, mammoth and hyena. However the Victorian archaeologists were mainly interested in items of size and beauty, and threw many of their findings away.
But the upcoming team of 12 archaeologists from the University of Edinburgh, which includes doctors, PhD students and undergraduates, have a careful three-week plan laid out.
Dr Rob Dinnis, whose research focuses on Neanderthals and modern humans during the European late Middle and Upper Palaeolithic periods, worked at the site in 2011, ’12 and ’14 when the team found the remains of bison, reindeer, woolly rhino and cave lion, which were probably all brought into the cave by hyenas.
The cave has lasted several Ice Ages and it was during the last Ice Age that the earth, bones and stone tools found their way into the cave, waiting to be found by archaeologists. It is the period around 40,000 years ago that Dr Dinnis wants to find evidence of, as that is when Neanderthals were replaced by modern humans.
He said: “After the last dig in Ffynnon Beuno in 2014 we carried out an analysis of the animal remains we found in the sediments, which lay undisturbed by the Victorian archaeologists as well as the badgers that have lived in the cave since.
"We carried out radiocarbon dating and found the bones were between 60,000 and 30,000 years old, during the time Neanderthals and modern humans lived by the cave. There might therefore be further evidence of that that can be uncovered.
“We will also sift through the soil heap left by the Victorian archaeologists, because there might be important objects that they had no interest in.”
Both Neanderthals and modern humans were hunter gatherers. Their occupation of Britain was not continuous, and they would have moved into and out of Britain depending on the climate.
Dr Dinnis said that Ffynnon Beuno is a “massively important” site nationally and internationally, because the evidence from the cave showed Neanderthals and then modern humans in Ice Age environments on the edge of the occupied world. He added that, along with Bontnewydd Cave by the River Elwy in Cefn Meiriadog, Denbighshire has rare archaeological value for this period.
Dr Dinnis said that it would be “extraordinary” to find remains of Neanderthals or modern humans during the dig, however the team is more likely to uncover stone tools.
“They could show when the two types of human existed. Furthermore, the animal bones can tell us what the environment was like, which can then help us to understand whether climate played a role in the extinction of the Neanderthals,” he added.
The team will carefully excavate sediment from the cave and carry it to the nearby tent where it will be screened, sieved to separate the small pieces and sorted for analysis. They will record where the sediment was taken from. Finds will be radiocarbon dated and analysed using other modern techniques.
When the dig is complete the information will be published and the items sent to be archived in the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff.
The project starts on June 26, when the team will hold free daily tours, except Mondays and Tuesdays.
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