Taforalt Cave (Grotte des Pigeons)
Taforalt
Middle Paleolithic to Epipalaeolithic (85,000–8,000 BP; cemetery 13,000 BCE)·Aterian / Iberomaurusian·🇲🇦 Oriental Region, Berkane Province, Morocco
Velatrix · CC0
About
About Taforalt Cave (Grotte des Pigeons)
Taforalt (Grotte des Pigeons) in the Beni Iznasen mountains 15 km SE of Berkane is Morocco's keystone Iberomaurusian cave — 28-m wide mouth yielding 15,000-year sequence from Middle Paleolithic Aterian tanged points (85 ka) to 13-ka Iberomaurusian cemetery of 34 adults with oldest funerary evidence in Africa: deliberate ochre-coated burials, fox-tooth ornaments, and 12,000-year-old calculus of wild oats showing early cereal use. Earliest human DNA from Africa (15 ka) extracted from Taforalt individuals reveals 63% Natufian-like ancestry linking Iberomaurusians to Levant. Engraved ostrich eggshell containers.
Why it mattersEarlies t proof of cemetery behaviour (15 ka) and cereal in human calculus (12 ka); 2018 aDNA overturns back-to-Africa model with Natufian tie.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Natufian gene flow direction
- 02Wild oat cultivation vs gathering
Theories
- 01Iberomaurusian as back-migrant from Levant rather than Sub-Saharan origin (Fregel 2018)
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- Deposit 85,000–8,000 BCE; main cemetery 15,000–11,000 BCE
- Period
- Middle Paleolithic to Epipalaeolithic (85,000–8,000 BP; cemetery 13,000 BCE)
- Culture
- Aterian / Iberomaurusian
- Builders
- Iberomaurusian hunter-gatherers
- Purpose
- Long-term rock shelter and collective cemetery with ritual ochre and shell ornaments
- Excavation
- Excavation ongoing
Deposit 85,000–8,000 BCE; main cemetery 15,000–11,000 BCE
Initial construction
c. 1429 CE
Rediscovery
On the ground
Structures & features
34.8106° N · 2.4083° W · 720 m · 3 mapped features
Gallery