Hohle Fels Schelklingen

World-famous Ice Age art

Visitors entering the imposing cave hall, with 500 square meters of floor space one of the largest in the Swabian Alb, are deeply touched and set back millennia in time. The 30-meter-high dome is the size of a cathedral.

The wondrous power of water has created the large cavities on the walls as well as the cave ceiling during hundreds of thousands of years. Then, the cave fell dry. A long time later, the river valley of the former Danube gave access to the cave.

Eventually, during the last Ice Age, the cave provided shelter for people. Archeologists could hardly believe what they found in the cave: Ice Age artwork like the world famous "Venus vom Hohle Fels", the "little lion man", the "water bird" and flutes. It was obviously here that man first found leisure to make music and carve figures from mammoth ivory and animal bones.

UNESCO therefore honoured the Hohle Fels cave together with five other caves in the Ach and Lone valleys as World Heritage Site "Caves and Ice Age Art of the Swabian Alb".