Today is Friday, March 4th and the last members of the team are in Kokopo-Rabaul. An unexpected last minute discovery has slightly modified our plans. During a meeting with the Consul of a small village close to Palmalmal in the county of "Marana", we were told of several caves in the vicinity. Bab, Tristan, Raphie and Lionel decided to remain a few days to make a quick assessment.

While the rest of us were loading our bags on the out-going vessel for Rabaul suddenly Lionel arriving on an old bicycle, all perspiring! He told us that they have just found rupestral engravings in one of these caves... After a rapid discussion, Flo and I decided to stay. Flo is as an archaeologist and even though pre-history is not her specialty her expertise will be useful. I would take photos of the engravings.

Over the course of 2 days we made a precise map of the small cave (30 m of development) and inspected all the walls and ceilings. Flo discovered some bones on the cave floor. They appeared to be human. We performed a quick dig and uncovered of a jaw and some teeth.

After cleaning and analysis we determined they were the remains of at least two individuals. A child (around 10 years old) and a young adult (20 to 30 years old). The teeth of the adult very worn and are levelled in in a way that seems to show that they would have consumed raw meat. By putting the jaw lower and the end of upper jaw together, Raphi (who manufactured dental prostheses in his former life!) showed that the lower jaw seems to be strongly prognathic [an underbit]. Moreover, measurements of this jaw lower (which by chance is complete) are higher than ours (10 cm between the 2 channels).

Other made significant, the long bones present many honest cuts and perpendicular striated marks. One of them has marks of teeth which strongly resemble human incisors. The photographs will make it possible to specialists to deliver their opinion on our initial analysis and to supplement them.

Engravings in the cave are numerous and are without doubt very old, as they are partly covered with calcite on several places. The rock is also corroded in places where it can be clearly seen that the engravings were made after these dissolution marks. It is impossible for us to say - without a dating or more information - the place and the period, if they are old or very old.

They are clustered mainly in three areas. But there are a few others scattered and hidden in other places.

The engravings represent: symbols, animals (tortoises, octopuses, casoar undoubtedly and perhaps a snake) as well as drawings of traditional Papua masks - simplified faces including one with marks of scarification.

These discovies are as surprising to us as they are to the local inhabitants The old man of the village knew of the cave entrance but not of the engravings and even less the bones. It seems that the missionaries have been quite effective at keeping the locals out of the caves by telling them they were the realm of bad spirits. Many of the natives came to the cave last evening to see the bones and to offer their own explanations as to their origin...

An article will be written for the Post Courrier, the national newspaper in PNG.

This year, in addition to the archaeological discovery,we mapped and explored 10,850 meters of passage . This brings the grand total of cave discovered over the course of three expeditions in the Nakanai range to 25 km. The deepest pit measured - 430 meters in depth and terminated at a beautiful siphon, perhaps a future objective for a team of divers.

Phil Bence