SHANIDAR CAVE — SOLECKI 403 



The mouth of the cave is shaped roughly like a broad triangle (pi. 2, 

 fig. 2). The opening measures 82 feet (25 m.) wide, and 26 feet (7.92 

 m.) high. Not far from the opening the width increases abruptly 

 toward the interior to an extreme of 175 feet (53.34 m.). The ceiling 

 vaults loftily to a jagged crevice about 45 feet (13.2 m.) above the 

 cave floor. From this point inward the ceiling falls away rapidly 

 to a height of 25 feet (7.62 m.), then gradually slopes to the rear until 

 the end of the cave is met, some 130 feet (39.62 m.) from the cave 

 mouth. The talus slope, with its yearly mounting debris, is steep, 

 slanting away to the gulley about 140 feet (42.67 m.) below (figs. 3, 4). 



SHANIDAR CAVe 

 PROFILE SECTION ON LINE AS 



Figure 3. — Section of Shaiildar cave showing extent of 1951 sounding (dotted line) and 



1953 sounding (dashed line). 



Between the colder winter months of November and April, a group 

 of Shirwani Kurds, about 35 people in all, or approximately 7 fami- 

 lies, inhabit the cave. They maintain small single-roomed winter 

 shelters constructed of log posts, branches, twigs, and straw ranged 

 around the sides of the cave interior. Each of these is warmed by a 

 stone-bordered open fire. Completing the scene of communal living 

 are the animal corrals for the goats, and hitching posts and tethering 

 stakes for the larger animals such as the cows and horses. It is appar- 

 ently customary for these cave inhabitants occasionally to light a large 

 communal fire, burning cakes of earth (observed during the 1951 

 season). These cakes are compacted segments of animal dung and 

 humus-containing cave-floor crust, which burn with a hot flame for 

 a long time. The sizable ash deposit left may account for the phe- 

 nomenon of large ash and fire remains in the topmost layer (Layer A) 



