New excavations at Con Moong cave reveal palaeolithic past

A third phase of excavation at the Con Moong Cave in Thanh Hoa Province reveal artefacts from the palaeolithic to neolithic periods of Vietnam’s past.

Cave holds ancient cemetery
Vietnam Net, 08 December 2012

The finds were part of a year-long research by scientists from the Viet Nam Archaeology Institute and the Novosibirsk Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography.

Announcing the results, the provincial culture department said the objects were from the third excavation this year in Con Moong Cave in Thach Thanh District. They were evidence of the development of civilisations from the Palaeolithic age (2.5 million BC to 10,000 BC) through the Neolithic age (9,000-6,000 BC).

Discoveries show tool-making techniques using pointed stone pieces, to self-sharpening stone tools, and changes in lifestyles from hunting and picking to early farming.

Con Moong is part of a system of caves and contains intact earth levels proving the changes in climate from the cold and dry of the glacier epoch and the subsequent hot and humid epoch that began 12,000 years ago and continues to the present time.

Full story here.