The Megalakkos (, ''Spelaio Megalokkos'') is a

rock shelter A rock shelter (also rockhouse, crepuscular cave, bluff shelter, or abri) is a shallow cave-like opening at the base of a bluff or cliff. In contrast to solutional caves (karst), which are often many miles long or wide, rock shelters are alm ...

located north of the village of Kleidonia in the Ioannina regional unit and around east of the Kleidi Cave, northwestern

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

. It sits atop the northern bank of the

Voidomatis The Voidomatis () is a river in the Ioannina regional unit in northwestern Greece, and is a tributary of the Aoös river. General description The main current sources are located in the village of Vikos. Along its path it converges with oth ...

river valley.

Archaeology

Archaeological excavations that were undertaken by a British team between 1983 and 1986 revealed the cave with a height of , it contained artefacts, stone tools,

fauna Fauna (: faunae or faunas) is all of the animal life present in a particular region or time. The corresponding terms for plants and fungi are ''flora'' and '' funga'', respectively. Flora, fauna, funga and other forms of life are collectively ...

l remains and other

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

s, that were dated back to the

Palaeolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic ( years ago) ( ), also called the Old Stone Age (), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone tools, and which represents almost the entire period of human prehist ...

and the

Epigravettian The Epigravettian (Greek: ''epi'' "above, on top of", and Gravettian) was one of the last archaeological industries and cultures of the European Upper Paleolithic. It emerged after the Last Glacial Maximum around ~21,000 cal. BP or 19,050 BC ...

culture between 20,000 and 12,000 years ago. Analogous discoveries were made by the same research team in the neighbouring Kleidi Cave.

References

Rock shelters of Greece Landforms of Ioannina (regional unit) Prehistoric Greece Landforms of Epirus (region) {{Epirus-geo-stub

Archaeology

Further reading

References