Last weekend, on a gloomy Easter Sunday, we visited Cresswell Crags, which is a very weird rift valley on the border between Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. The cliff walls on both sides are riddled with caves that have been used by humans since the Ice Age, when this marked the northernmost habitable point for stone-age nomadic hunters. They've found the remains of hyenas, woolly rhinos, bison and others.
In 2003 they discovered prehistoric cave-art here - the only authenticated cave-art in Britain, and the most northerly in Europe. It's around 13,000 years old!
It's also incredibly difficult to spot. Here's what the bison carving is supposed to look like - and my movie of the guide outlining it with a laser point:
Here's an antlered deer, much overlaid by other graffiti:
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| from the Stone Circles Website |
Can you spot it? The red laser dot is on the eye:
The most obvious piece is an ibis bird (carved from memory - they didn't come this far north even in summer)
And, to my infinite delight, this triangle below is coyly described as a "womb" symbol - it's the OLDEST DEPICTION OF FEMALE GENITALIA IN THE COUNTRY 💖💖💖
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| "One for the wank-bank" |
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