JEDDAH, 5 March 2008 — Studies on human remains discovered at Um Jarsan cave in Khaibar, north of Madinah, have established that some of bones are 6,440 years old, according to a report carried by Al-Watan Arabic daily. Um-Jarsan is one of the largest caves in the Arab world with a length of 1,500 meters.

An expert team from the Saudi Geological Survey (SGS) found human skulls and bones of animals and engravings that date back thousands of years.

SGS President Zuhair Nawab said his organization sent samples to a leading science and technology university in Poland to determine their age.

“The results showed that some findings were 2,300 years old. Some of the human skulls found at the cave were 2,150 years old while others were 5,400 years old,” he said, adding that the oldest skull found at the cave was estimated to be 6,440 years old, which pre-dates the emergence of agriculture in human civilization in what is now Iraq.

The team had also found remains of wild antelope an expert at the Polish university said they were 4,285 years old. Nawab said the studies were part of a major project that began in 1999 to survey the Kingdom’s many caves. “We have already conducted studies on more than 300 caves across the country,” he added.

Nawab said SGS experts are also studying the impact of development projects on these caves.

The SGS began its studies on Saudi caves and lava tubes since 1999, when a foreign expert was first hired by the organization and a team of Saudi geologists was built that could systematically investigate underground cavities in the Kingdom. Spelunking groups regularly explore the Kingdom’s many unmolested caves. One group in the late 90s found human remains less than 30 meters inside the entrance that were later found to be at least hundreds of years old.

The interest in Saudi caves has coincided with a Kingdom-wide interest in developing sites of for tourism purposes. But as part of its scientific mandate, SGS has an interest in caves because they may contain a detailed record of past climate, surface processes, and be sources of data that can be used in studies of climate change.