Bear-clawed cavern discovered in Spain ‘opens new door on prehistory’

Researchers hail world-class discovery' that suggests cave bears may have lived farther south than thought

Researchers exploring a cave system in south-east Spain have discovered a huge cavern, sealed off for millennia, hung with huge stalactites and gouged by the claws of long-extinct cave bears, which, they claim, opens a new door on prehistory".

The find was made at the Cueva del Arco, a collection of caves in the Almadenes gorge near the Murcian town of Cieza. Although the site had already yielded evidence of settlements stretching back 50,000 years - making it one of the few places in the eastern Iberian peninsula where the transition from Neanderthals to modern humans can be documented - experts digging there suspected it harboured further discoveries.