Laang Spean
Laang Spean is a prehistoric cave site on top of a limestone hill in Battambang Province, north-western Cambodia. The site's name Cave of Bridges is in reference to the multiple limestone arches that remain after the partial collapse of the cave's vault. Excavations are still in progress, and at least three distinct levels of ancient human occupation have been documented. At the site's deepest layers, around 5 meters below the ground, primitive flaked stone tools were unearthed, dating back to around 71,000 years BP. Above layers contain records of the Hoabinhian, whose stratigraphic and chronological context has yet to be defined. Future excavations at Laang Spean might help to clarify the concept and "nature of the Hoabinhian" occupation and provide new data on the Pleistocene/Holocene transition in the region.
Documentation
Roland Mourer and Cécile Mourer-Chauviré, working for the Royal University of Phnom Penh, undertook the first excavations from 1965 to 1969 and revealed evidence of prehistoric human occupation in Laang Spean from as long as 6,240 years BP ago. Objects that were found included tools made of hornfel, pottery, burnt animal bones, carbonized matter, shells of mollusks and a great variety of micro fauna remains. In a deeper middle layer artifacts and tools were excavated that "showed similarities with so-called Hoabinhian sites that had been uncovered in Southeast Asia, suggesting the possibility of a common cultural bedrock for a group of humans stretching from Burma to Vietnam." Thirty years of war and ten years of mine clearing prevented further excavations.The French-Cambodian Prehistoric Mission - a team founded by the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign affairs in 2009, and led by Pr 'Hubert Forestier and Dr. Heng Sophady' - of Cambodian and French archaeologists and students - has resumed archaeological work since 2009 in room no. 2 over a surface of more than that provides new stratigraphic, chronocultural and archaeo-zoological results. Currently, 20 stratigraphic units are recorded on a ground surface of to a depth of 5 meters without reaching the bedrock.
The Neolithic burial sites of four men and one woman dating from 3,700 to 3,300 BP. were found in one of the top layers. Some graves were lavishly adorned with stone jewelry while others lacked adornment, suggesting emergent social stratification among the population and provides researchers with "an original chronological, cultural landmark for South-East Asia, at the beginning of the Ages of Metal".
The Hoabinhian level contains split pebble tools and abundant faunal remains that date between 11,000 and 5000 years BP. The team discovered "a large stone featuring what appear to be etchings in the shape of an arrow, dyed with a redocher color...It could be the first case of art in Cambodia".
The team uncovered rudimentary stone tools in the deepest Palaeolithic levels from as far back as 71.000 years BP.