Aveline's Hole — LLMpedia

Aveline's Hole
Name	Aveline's Hole
Location	Mendip Hills, Somerset, England
Geology	Limestone

Contents

Aveline's Hole is a small limestone cave on the Mendip Hills in Somerset, England, noted for an Early Mesolithic and Neolithic human assemblage and for being one of the earliest sites with a substantial series of human burials in Britain. The site has been important to researchers from institutions such as the British Museum, the Royal Society, and the University of Bristol, and has featured in publications by figures associated with the Society of Antiquaries of London, the British Association for the Advancement of Science, and regional bodies like the Somerset Archaeological and Natural History Society. Excavations and analyses have connected the site to broader debates involving the Mesolithic period, the Neolithic Revolution, and palaeoenvironmental reconstructions tied to the Holocene.

Location and Geological Description

Aveline's Hole is located within the Mendip Hills near the village of Wrington and the town of Winscombe in Somerset. The cave lies in Carboniferous limestone strata associated with karst morphology characteristic of the Great Oolite Group and the Carboniferous Limestone Supergroup, and features phreatic conduits and vadose passages comparable to formations explored by the British Caving Association and surveyed in projects by the Geological Society of London and the British Geological Survey. Surface hydrology in the catchment connects to sinkholes and swallow holes documented in reports by the Environment Agency and the Mendip Cave Registry. The local topography places the site within a landscape studied by the National Trust and described in the context of Exmoor National Park and regional routeways noted in Roman Britain field studies.

The site was first excavated in the 19th century by antiquarians affiliated with the Somerset Archaeological and Natural History Society and later recorded by scholars connected to the British Museum and the Royal Anthropological Institute. Notable figures and institutions involved across successive interventions include members of the Society of Antiquaries of London, curators from the Victoria and Albert Museum, and archaeologists trained at the University of Cambridge and the University of Oxford. Fieldwork methods evolved in line with standards promoted by the Institute of Archaeology and the Council for British Archaeology, moving from antiquarian collection to stratigraphic recording influenced by protocols of the International Union for Quaternary Research and practice published in journals such as the Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society and the Journal of Archaeological Science. Archive materials from the excavations are held in repositories including the British Library and regional museums like the Mendip Museum.

Excavators recovered a series of human skeletal remains representing some of the earliest documented collective interments in Britain, attracting attention from osteologists at the Natural History Museum and bioarchaeologists at the Wellcome Trust. Analyses compared morphological traits with assemblages from sites like Star Carr, Paviland Cave, and Gough's Cave, and were integrated into debates on population dynamics involving geneticists at the Wellcome Sanger Institute and palaeodemographers linked to the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. Interpretations of burial practice have been debated in relation to ritual behaviors discussed at conferences of the European Association of Archaeologists and within frameworks developed by the World Archaeological Congress and comparative studies drawing on burial traditions from Orkney and Wessex.

Radiocarbon determinations from the site were produced by laboratories affiliated with the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit, the Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre, and calibration programs coordinated with the International Radiocarbon Intercomparison and reports in the Radiocarbon journal. Dates place primary deposition within the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition, aligning with chronologies of neighboring sites such as Star Carr, Hoxne, and Cheddar Gorge, and contributing data to regional syntheses by the Antiquity journal and the Royal Anthropological Institute. Bayesian modelling approaches applied by researchers at the University of York and the University of Edinburgh refined the site chronology within frameworks used by the European Research Council and the British Academy.

Faunal remains recovered include species comparable to assemblages from Gough's Cave, Kents Cavern, and Paviland Cave, and have been analyzed by zooarchaeologists at the Natural History Museum and the University of Southampton. Botanical and pollen evidence was assessed using methods advanced by the Quaternary Research Association and specialists at the Plymouth Marine Laboratory, and contributes to reconstructions of Holocene vegetation dynamics discussed in publications by the International Union for Quaternary Research and the Royal Society. Environmental proxies link local ecology to broader patterns observed in studies of Doggerland, coastal resource use documented in Dorset, and inland adaptations considered in the context of the British Isles Mesolithic–Neolithic transition.

Management of the site involves stakeholders such as the Somerset County Council, the Mendip Hills AONB Partnership, and conservation agencies including the Historic England and the Environment Agency, with heritage advice from the National Trust and access protocols coordinated with the British Caving Association and local landowners. Collections and archival material are curated by institutions like the Mendip Museum, the British Museum, and university repositories including the University of Bristol and are subject to policies set by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists. Public engagement and interpretation have drawn on programming from the Museums Association and collaborations with regional educational trusts and community archaeology initiatives supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Category:Caves of Somerset Category:Archaeological sites in Somerset Category:Mendip Hills