Cova Foradà

Cova Foradà (or Cova Foradada) is an archaeological site consisting of a cave with remains of Neanderthals near Oliva, in the Province of Valencia, Spain [1]. The most complete skeleton of a Neanderthal ever found on the Iberian peninsula was found there in 2010 [1]. The karst cave is located 5 kilometres southeast of the village of Oliva, at 3.5 kilometres from the coast of the Mediterranean, and archaeological excavations have taken place since 1977 [1]. The cave is found in a low hill, one of a group of hills called the Muntanyetes de Oliva, the last part of the Serra de Mustalla before the floodplain that ends at the coast [1]. It has been occupied since the Middle Paleolithic, including in the Mousterian and Mesolithic periods, and in the Bronze Age [1]. A maxilla (almost complete, with a number of teeth), a molar, a fibula, and four fragments of a cranium belonging to two humans were found between 2000 and 2003, in what appeared to be a layer from the Mousterian [1].