Pilisszántó Cave

The Pilisszántó stone cell is one of Hungary's specially protected caves. It is located in the Pilis Mountains within the Danube–Ipoly National Park. Archaeological and paleontological finds have been recovered from it. It is also described in tourist guidebooks.

Description

It is situated in a rock wall on the Pilis summit, in the rocky DK break at the foot of the mountain, in the outskirts of Pilisszántó, east-northeast of the town centre, above Orosdy Castle, in a specially protected area, with a horizontal axis orientation and a large entrance. Tourist maps indicate its location with its name and a cave symbol. From its entrance hall there is a beautiful view of the Piliscsaba basin and the Hosszú Hill, Kevélyek ridge. The inactive spring cave developed in Triassic Dachstein limestone. It consists of a large chamber where archaeological and paleontological excavations were carried out. It can be visited without a permit and without cave‑walking equipment.

In Hungary, besides the Pilisszántó stone cell, rosmak bone has been found in only seven caves: the Király‑kúti‑zsomboly, the Lengyel cave, the Pes‑stone cave, the Puskaporosi stone cell, the Remete cave, the Remete‑hegyi stone cell and the Suba‑hole.

In 1939 the cave was mentioned for the first time in literature under the name Pilisszántó stone cell. The cave appears in literature also as I. sz. stone cell (Torma 1986), Stone cell (Ferencz 1953), Orosdi stone cell (Mayerfelsi Maier 1926), Orosdi stone cell (Kadić 1913), Orosdy cave, Orosdy stone cell (Kadić 1915), Orosdy stone cell (Bertalan 1976), Orozdy stone cell (Lambrecht 1964), Pilisszántó I. stone cell (Gábori 1977), Pilisszántó 1. sz. stone cell (Ringer 1989), Pilisszántó small stone cell (Láng 1953), Pilisszántó stone cell (Hillebrand 1915), Szántói‑stone cell (Szablyár 2003) and Szántói stone cell (Barcza, Thirring 1920).

1913–1948

The 1913 Cave Investigation states that at the suggestion of Imre Gábor Bekey and at the request of Mihály Lenhossék, Ottó Kadić traveled to Pilisszántó on 24 October 1912 and conducted a three‑day trial excavation in the Pilisszántó stone cell (Orosdi stone cell) located in Pilisszántó (Pest‑Pilis‑Solt‑Kiskun county). The Orosdi stone cell lies on the border of Pilisszántó, under the DK mouth of Pilis mountain, above Orosdy Castle. The cave’s large entrance facing the K leads to a chamber 8 m long, 8 m wide and very high. In the middle of the front part of the chamber Kadić Ottó dug a trial pit 6 m long, 2 m wide and locally 2 m deep. Beneath a 1.5 m thick humus cover, which contains recent mammoth bones and pottery shards, a yellow clay layer stretches, filled with microfauna and Rangifer tarandus bones. The excavation had to be halted because further downward digging was impossible due to collapsed large rock blocks and the autumn weather became unbearable. Based on the good results of the two‑day research, continuation of the stone cell excavation was justified.

In the 1915 Bar Excavation Volume 1 it is stated that in the Pilisszántó stone cell (Orosdy stone cell) in Pilisszántó, the first trial excavations were carried out by Ottokár Kadić in 1912 and by Tivadar Kormos in the spring of 1914. Based on the encouraging results of the two trial excavations, Tivadar Kormos, in October 1914, excavated the stone cell for 8 days. The stone cell’s fill, rich in fossil bones and traces of the Magdalénian prehistoric culture, is up to 3 m thick in some places, therefore the complete excavation of the cave will still require about 2 weeks. Tivadar Kormos reported the results of the research so far at the 1915 year‑end meeting of the Bar Excavation Section of the Hungarian Geological Society. The section covered the excavation’s cost of 100 crowns from a donation of the Hungarian National Museum’s antiquities collection.

In the 1915 Bar Excavation Volume 2 it is mentioned that Tivadar Kormos gave his lecture “New Traces of Reindeer Hunters in the Pilis Mountains” at the year‑end meeting of the Bar Excavation Section of the Hungarian Geological Society on 21 January 1915. In the 1915 Bar Excavation, in the publication “Results of the Research Conducted in the Jankovich Cave at Bajót in 1914 and 1915” written by Jenő Hillebrand, it is noted that stone‑ and bone‑industry types characteristic of Magdalénian sites in Western Europe have already been found at several locations in Hungary. Tivadar Kormos has recently found (in the Pilisszántó stone cell) the previously missing bone‑tool type.

According to the book titled *Budapest Duna-jobbparti környéke* published in 1920, the area yielded prehistoric human and animal remains from the Pilisszántó stone shelter, the Remete-hegy stone shelter, the Kis-kevélyi cave and the Jankovich cave. On the ÉK side (facing Orosdy Castle) of the massive DK rock face of Pilis Mountain, among beautiful rock formations (rarely visited climbing school) at an altitude of 423 m a.s.l., lies the Szántói stone shelter with a huge entrance facing ÉK. Through the cave entrance one can reach a chamber ending in a 9 m deep, upward-closed dome. In this stone shelter Tivadar Kormos conducted a very successful excavation in 1914–1915. In the diluvial deposits of the cave there were many tiny bone fragments, e.g. 36 000 bird bones and 8 000 mammal bones, which mostly came from small animals. The small animals were brought into the stone shelter by predatory birds (owls). The cave contained many reindeer remains. Prehistoric humans hunted the reindeer. That prehistoric humans indeed visited here is proven by 41 Paleolithic stone tools and bone implements. The scientific value of the stone shelter is extremely high, because the analysis of the archaeological and paleontological material found in the fill provided a clear picture of the post‑glacial conditions of the Pilis Mountains.