Cave in Tatras yields traces of ancient habitation

Recent findings by a Slovak archaeologist and his Polish colleague have shown that a cave in the High Tatra mountains near Poprad (Presov region) called Hučivá diera - or Rumbling Hole - was used as a shelter for people 15,000 years ago. The cave was discovered and is being studied by Marián Soják of the Slovak Academy of Sciences (SAV) and Pawel Valde-Nowak of Jagiellonian University in Krakow. SAV spokesperson Monika Hucáková told TASR on Tuesday that the findings shed new light on the prehistoric settlement of Europe. The cave is the first one in the High Tatras to yield evidence of prehistoric settlement on both the Slovak and Polish sides of the mountains. The researchers stated that they hadn't expected to find that the caves were once settled, as there were glaciers in the Tatras, and forests didn't reach such high altitudes at the time of settlement, the end of the Ice Age. The settlers appear to have come from today's southern Poland, as flint from that region was found in the cave.