Remete-hegyi No 8 Cave

Remete-hegy No. 8 cave is one of the caves located in the Remete Gorge in the Danube–Ipoly National Park. It is the longest cave of the Remete Gorge.

Description

In the Buda Landscape Protection Area, on the north side of the Remete Gorge, on the southeastern side of Remete Hill, in the outskirts of Remeteszőlős, near the Budapest border, in a specially protected area, the two entrances open in shrubbery and rock climbing terrain. The upper entrance of the cave is about 10 metres southwest of the westernmost entrance of the Seven‑hole. The lower entrance is 80 centimetres wide, natural, irregular, circular and vertically oriented. The narrower upper entrance is 70 centimetres wide, 35 centimetres high, natural, oval and sloping in axis direction. The upper entrance is located about two metres higher and 6–7 metres horizontally from the lower entrance.

Upper Triassic, Dachstein limestone, formed essentially along a steep north–south‑oriented tectonic fault by corrosion and dissolution below the karst water level. A vertically oriented, multi‑level cave. The fissure‑slab type is characteristic of its passages. The large morphological forms are the shaft and the dome chamber. Among the small morphological forms, a spherical dome has formed within it. In the cave a breccia zone, ancient artifacts, straw stalactite, stalactite rod, stalactite encrustation, micro‑tufa, mountain milk, pepperstone and the re‑dissolution of deposits can be observed.

The lower entrance leads to a downward widening shaft 11–12 meters deep, which is traversable for experienced cavers, but since the lower part of the shaft has a damp, wet wall, the use of a handhold rope is also recommended. Finger-like stalactites have formed in the shaft. From the upper entrance one can reach the bottom of the cave without rope and technical equipment. South of the lower entrance there is a chamber whose walls are covered in large quantities with brownish and blackish, reversed-surface calcite crusts as well as stalactite draperies. The fissure leading from the upper entrance has, at the upper level, a main passage composed of large collapse blocks and between the rock blocks the hair‑thin roots of trees penetrate into the cave. The unrestricted horizontal extent of the cave is 20 meters. It can be visited with permission and the use of rope‑technical equipment.

In 1984 the cave was first called Remete-hegyi 8. sz. barlang in the literature. The cave appears in the literature as 8th numbered cave (Horváth, Szunyogh 1971), Eighth‑hole (Horváth, Szunyogh 1971), Eighth hole (Bertalan 1976), Remete-hegyi 8.sz. barlang (Gazda 2004), Remetehegyi 8. sz. barlang (Bertalan 1976) and Zinner Károly‑cave (Bertalan 1971). The name Zinner Károly‑cave was intended to be given to the cave by members of the FTC Cave Research Section in 1964.

Research history

The 1877 Archaeologiai Értesítő mentions that the antiquities department of the Hungarian National Museum was enriched in November by one (animal‑derived) lower jawbone, two bones and three pieces of pottery. These finds, which came from a rock cavity located near Remetemária in Buda, were donated to the museum by Lóczy Lajos. The 1904 Budapest Antiquities notes mention that the rock cavities of Remetemária were probably Stone Age pasture sites, from which Lóczy Lajos (Archaeological N., 168/1877.) brought coarse pottery fragments to the Hungarian National Museum.

It first saw the light in 1937, and in a publication written by István Jablonkay it is mentioned that on the left wall of the Remete gorge, at a distance of 50 m from the stream (upper level) and 10 m higher (lower level) there are spring caves. The spring cave located on the upper level is less developed and uglier than the other spring cave situated on the upper level, which can be observed along the entire length of the gorge. If a cave’s erosion base moves downwards, the cave’s water system follows. This can happen, for example, when water leaves the old transitional cave and the old spring cave, and then, descending through thin cracks in the rock, creates a new cave system. In this case a new spring cave opens beneath the old one, at the new level of the subsided erosion base. The old upper entrance is then broken by the remaining karst breccia. The abandoned spring caves lining the left wall of the Remete gorge are fine examples of this process. The erosion base of these caves was the stream of the cave whose collapse formed the gorge. The upper‑level caves indicate the former height of the gorge‑cave stream before the segmental change.

In the chapter written by Ferenc Tompa in the 1942 book *Budapest története* it is mentioned that after Flóris Rómer, Géza Nagy also noted that coarse pots emerged from the rock niches of Remetemária, probably originating from the polished stone age. Sándor Leél‑Őssy gave a lecture at the Hungarian Hydrological Society meeting of 9 March 1949. The topic of the lecture was the Seven‑hole. The lecture also mentioned the other caves of the Remete gorge. Sándor Leél‑Őssy gave a lecture at the society’s specialist meeting of 9 November 1949, in which he presented the caves of the Remete gorge.

The text of the lecture given by Sándor Leél-Őssy on March 9, 1949 was published in issues 3–4 of the 1950 volume of the Hydrological Gazette. The publication is titled The Seven‑Hole Cave of Remete Hill. The study mentions that the currently high‑located but already dry, dying spring caves of Remete Hill were formed in the Pliocene and early Pleistocene. (Cave under the seven holes, Remete‑hill stone cell and several other smaller unfinished or broken caves, as well as a spring chamber.) Afterwards, due to the young tectonic uplift and the climatic origin of the erosion base’s incision, the karst water level of Remete Hill also fell and the caves that had become dry began to die out.