Cave of Gorham

The cave of Gorham is located at Gibraltar, in the south of the Iberian peninsula. It owes its name to the captain Gorham, officer English who discovered it in 1907. In 1848, the site close to Forbes' Quarry delivered the first known cranium néandertalien; this one however was not immediately identified like the witness of disappeared mankind.

The cave of Gorham was excavated of 1948 to 1954 by J.A. Waechter then of 1999 to 2005 by a team of the Museum of Gibraltar led by Clive Finlayson. She delivered a stratigraphy of more than 10 m of power, comprising six levels Moustérien S and two levels attached to Épigravettien of Raising Spanish.

Recent research seems to show that the Néandertalien S lived there until - 28.000 years, even - 24.000 years. They lengthily would thus have cohabited with the anatomically modern Hommes, present in the area since 32.000 years.

Sources

Vega Toscano, L. (1988) - “Gibraltar, Spain”, in: Dictionary of Prehistory , Leroi-Gourhan, A., (ED.), PUF, pp. 443-444.
Finlayson, C. and Al (2006) “Late survival off Neanderthals At the southernmost extreme off Natural Europe”, , advanced online publication, September 13rd, 2006.
Brill, D. (2006) “Neanderthal' S last stand”, news@nature.com , September 13rd, 2006.

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