Posted on 09/28/2005 9:18:30 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
A team of Moroccan archaeologists working in the well-known Grotte des Pigeons cave at Tafoghalt, near Oujda, have recently brought to light human remains dating to around 11,000/12,000 BC, MAP news agency announced Monday... Luckily for the archaeologists, these people buried their dead in the cave. More than 200 individuals have been revealed during the long-standing excavations, including nearly 100 children... one of the skeletons had been buried with the horns of a Barbary sheep. This animal was very plentiful in the mountainous regions surrounding the cave and was certainly hunted by these early populations. The fact that its horns were buried with a skeleton will allow a better understanding of the funeral rites practices by these early Moroccans. Stone and bone tools were also found beside the buried bodies. An earlier study had shown that these people cared for their handicapped: after a serious accident, resulting in the total loss of one arm and the almost total loss of another, one woman nevertheless managed to live to an advanced age. This showed that these cave dwellers did not throw out a useless mouth but even looked after an impotent woman for many years.
(Excerpt) Read more at moroccotimes.com ...
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It's always interesting that we keep finding evidence that the elderly and infirm were cared for in prehistoric times. To me it suggests that prehistoric man may have been more effective at hunting and possibly harvesting and maybe even some simple farming than we previously thought.
And such evidence is even older than this. Agriculture has been around at least 14 thousand years.
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