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Għar Dalam Cave

Għar Dalam

Malta · Birżebbuġa

CaveIntermittent excavation
Approximate period5,200 BCE — 4,500 BCEPleistocene fossil layers and Early Neolithic human use See on the map ↓

In brief

Cave excavations have revealed numerous fossils belonging to Malta's Ice Age animal communities. The upper cultural layer contains evidence of Early Neolithic human use and the introduction of domestic animals to the island.

What was found?

  • 1Dwarf elephant fossils

    Bones of small-bodied elephants were found in the cave's fossil-bearing layers. They are important for investigating the reduction in size of large mammals under island conditions.

  • 2Hippopotamus fossils

    These are the remains of hippopotamuses that do not live in Malta today. They show how different the island's past animal communities were from those of today.

  • 3Deer bones

    Deer remains are also present in the cave's stratigraphic sequence. They contribute to comparisons of animal communities from different periods.

  • 4Early Neolithic cultural layer

    The upper cultural layer contains evidence of human use of the cave. Heritage Malta associates this phase with Early Neolithic communities that brought domestic animals from Sicily.

What does it point to?

The layers of Għar Dalam preserve the animal world before human use and later Neolithic life as separate phases. The fossils make the effects of isolated life on the island visible, while the upper layer reveals the arrival of people with domestic animals.

What did it teach us?

  1. It documented that elephants, hippopotamuses and deer lived in Malta in the past.
  2. It provided fossil evidence of changes in animal body size under island conditions.
  3. It made it possible to distinguish Early Neolithic human use from older fossil accumulations.

Images

ANIMAL BONES - GHAR DALAM CAVE - BIRZEBBUGIA (1746308852)
KNOW MALTA by Peter Grima · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
GharDalam-VueGrotte
Jean-Christophe BENOIST · CC BY 2.5 · Wikimedia Commons

Record

Culture
Maltese Early Neolithic communities
First modern dig
1865
Team / historical
Heritage Malta and the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage
Coordinates
35.8364°, 14.5280°

Sources

  1. heritagemalta.mt
  2. um.edu.mt
  3. heritagemalta.mt
  4. en.wikipedia.org
  5. Għar Dalam Cave and Museum — Google Arts & Culture

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