Kebara Cave


Kebara Cave is an Israeli limestone cave locality in Wadi Kebara, situated at above sea level on the western escarpment of the Carmel Range, in the Ramat HaNadiv preserve of Zichron Yaakov.

History

The cave was inhabited between 60,000 and 48,000 BP and is famous for its excavated finds of hominid remains, made under the direction of Professor Ofer Bar-Yosef.
Dorothy Garrod and Francis Turville-Petre excavated in the cave in the early 1930s, but by far the most significant discovery made at Kebara Cave was Kebara 2 in 1982, the most complete postcranial Neanderthal skeleton found to date. Nicknamed "Moshe" and dating to circa 60,000 BP, the skeleton preserved a large part of one individual's torso. The cranium and most of the lower limbs were missing. The hyoid bone was also preserved, and was the first Neanderthal hyoid bone found.
The Kebaran culture is named after the site.