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Kleine Feldhofer Grotte

Archaeological sites in GermanyMettmann (district)Neanderthal sites
Kleine Feldhofer Grotte
Kleine Feldhofer Grotte

Kleine Feldhofer Grotte was a karstic limestone cave and a paleoanthropologic site in the Neander Valley in western Germany. In August 1856, the Neanderthal type specimen was unearthed from the cave. Miners uncovered a skull cap and a number of skeletal bones to be labeled Neanderthal. The bones belong to at least three distinct individuals. The cave was situated in a limestone gorge with the interior dimensions of 3 m (9.8 ft) in width by 5 m (16 ft) in length by 3 m (9.8 ft) in height, and a 1 m (3.3 ft) opening 20 m (66 ft) above the valley floor in the south wall which was 50 m (160 ft) high. The cave got its name from the nearby large farm of the Feldhof.The cave was destroyed during the 19th century as a result of industrial-scale limestone quarrying which widened the gorge. The location of the cave was soon forgotten and by 1900, unknown. In 1997 a successful search for the site of the cave and its deposits yielded 24 fragments of human bone, one of which, identified as NN 13, fit exactly onto the left lateral femoral condyle of the Neanderthal 1 fossil. The 2000 excavation resulted in the recovery of thousands of artifacts. The mitochondrial DNA of two bone samples were fully sequenced, and completed in 2009.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Kleine Feldhofer Grotte (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Kleine Feldhofer Grotte
Mettmanner Straße,

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N 51.2275 ° E 6.9455555555556 °
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Fundstätte des Neanderthalers

Mettmanner Straße
40699 , Hochdahl
North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
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Kleine Feldhofer Grotte
Kleine Feldhofer Grotte
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Neandertal (valley)
Neandertal (valley)

The Neandertal (, also US: , German: [neˈʔandɐtaːl]; sometimes called "the Neander Valley" in English) is a small valley of the river Düssel in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, located about 12 km (7.5 mi) east of Düsseldorf, the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia. The valley lies within the limits of the towns of Erkrath and Mettmann. In August, 1856, the area became famous for the discovery of Neanderthal 1, one of the first specimens of Homo neanderthalensis to be found. The Neandertal was originally a limestone canyon widely known for its rugged scenery, waterfalls and caves. However, industrial quarrying during the 19th and 20th centuries removed most of the limestone and dramatically changed the shape of the valley. It was during such a quarrying operation that the bones of the original Neanderthal man were found in a cave known as Kleine Feldhofer Grotte. Neither the cave nor the cliff in which the bones were located still exist. During the 19th century, the valley was called Neanderhöhle (Neander's Cave) and, after 1850, Neanderthal. It was named after Joachim Neander, a 17th-century German pastor. Neander is the Graeco-Roman translation of his family name Neumann; both names mean "new man". Neumann lived in nearby Düsseldorf and loved the valley for giving him the inspiration for his compositions. Former names of the gorge were Das Gestein (The Boulders) and Das Hundsklipp (Cliff of dogs, perhaps in the sense of "Cliff of Beasts"). In 1901, an orthographic reform in Germany changed the spelling of Thal (valley) to Tal. Scientific names, such as Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens neanderthalensis for Neanderthal remained unchanged, because the laws of taxonomy retain the original spelling at the time of naming. However, Neanderthal station never changed its name to conform with the new German orthography and the modern Neanderthal Museum retains the original spelling.

Mettmann Zentrum station
Mettmann Zentrum station

Mettmann Zentrum ("Mettmann centre") station is a Rhine-Ruhr S-Bahn station in the town of Mettmann in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It was opened in 1953 on the last section of the Düsseldorf-Derendorf–Dortmund Süd railway from Mettmann station (now Mettmann Stadtwald station) to the Rhenish Railway Company's Düsseldorf station. It was opened in 1953 as Mettmann West station and given its current name on 26 September 1999.The station is served by Rhine-Ruhr S-Bahn line S 28 at 20-minute intervals. The station is served by 11 bus routes, SB68 (Dornap – Wieden – Wuppertal, every 60 minutes), O10 (Mettmann Süd – Stadtwald + Kaldenberg – Metzkausen, every 60 minutes), O11 (Metzkausen – Hasselbeckstr + Friedhof Lindenheide, every 60 minutes), O13 (Stadtwald + Danziger Str – Jubiläumsplatz, every 20 minutes), 738 (Gerresheim Krankenhaus – Dreherstr – Düsseldorf Hbf, every 20–60 minutes), 741 (Neanderthal – Hochdahl – Hilden – Südfriedhof, every 20–60 minutes), 742 (Gruiten – Haan – Thienhausen, every 20–60 minutes), 743 (Neanderthal – Erkrath, every 60 minutes), 745 (Dornap – Wieden – Vohwinkel, every 60 minutes), 745 (Dornap – Wieden – Wuppertal, every 60 minutes), 746 (Wülfrath – Tönisheide – Velbert, every 20 minutes) and 749 (Metzkausen – Ratingen – Kaiserswerth, every 60 minutes). All are operated by Rheinbahn or in conjunction with Kreisverkehrsgesellschaft Mettmann (741, 742, 743, 746 and 749).