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Summary

Kent's cavern

Location

Protected Status

• Scheduled Monument 1010745: Kent's Cavern, Torquay

Other References/Statuses

• Torbay HER: MTO9726

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• CAVE (Lower Palaeolithic to Roman - 500000 BC to 409 AD)

Full description

Torbay HER record (SMR record). SDV361984.

Imported from Torbay HER

Pengelly, W., 1884, Transactions of the Devonshire Association, p.396-403 (Article in Serial). SDV362708.

The Bear's Den. A vast boss of stalagmite covered with inscriptions; the earliest inscribed in 1571 by one William Petre.Macenery had found a number of bear skeletons here, hebce the chamber's name.Tteeth, bones, coprolites and a few bits of coarse pottery were found in the excavated material Macenery had thrown aside. More teeth, Further bones, coprolites and 11 flints were found in Pengelly's excavations, including:.

1. A small delicately-proportioned white flake tool, both ends blunt but the edges sharp, the inner face was almost flat the outer strongly ridged. It was found with six bear teeth and one of mammoth in the cave earth on 1 November 1876.

2. An irregular rolled flint nodule with two flakes dislodges was found in the fourth foot-level of the breccia in November 1876.

3. A white scimitar-shaped flake implement with the point was lost, nearly flat on one side, strongly ridged on the other with lateral margins thin and sharp.It was found with the relics of bear, elephant and hyena in the first foot-level of the cave earth.

4. A white flake, a parallelogram in outline, slightly convex on the inner face, doubly ridged on the outer, and quite thin at the lateral margins, one of them being somewhat notched, and thick at each end. It was probably the central portion of a tool of greater length. It was found with the teeth of bear and hyena in the first foot-level of the cave earth in December 1876.

5. A cherty flint nodule-implement, sharply-pointed, rudely heart-shaped tool, retaining some of its original surface was found in the second foot-level of the breccia in January 1877.

6. A rough specimen of chert, retaining the remnants of the original surface of its nodule, was found in the first foot-level of the breccia in March 1877.

7. A flint implement irregularly convex on each face, pointed at one end and rounded at the other; it retained traces of the original surface of the nodule. It was found in the second foot-level of the breccia in March 1877.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events: none recorded

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