PREHISTORY

Although some historians assure that some shaped stones found in our beaches and hills would justify human presence in Torremolinos 150,000 years ago, the most solid proofs of our prehistory are found in the nine human skulls, tenths of bones, vessels of clay, nibs of axes, and arrows, ornaments of necklaces and bracelets, one ring and some animal bones appeared in the excavations in the now disappeared Cuevas del Tesoro, Cueva Tapada, Cueva de los Tejones and Cueva del Encanto, in the site known as Punta de Torremolinos, today Castle of Santa Clara and surroundings.

Detailed study of these items places them in the so called Neolithic Period of the Quaternaries Era, some 5,000 years BC, period characterized for the beginning of agriculture and cattle raising, pottery making, wool weaving y working the stone to obtain home and hunting tools. Metals were not known yet.

These characteristics agree with the rests found in our caves, which means that those primitive Neolithic settlers of Torremolinos were not only pottery makers, but also knew rope ( they used it to decorate their vessels); they knew how to braid it in order to hold the stones of their axes and arrows, the decorations in their necklaces and bracelets. Moreover, we assume that they could weave and make their own dresses.

And now we wonder, what were those men and women like?

Some historians conclude that they were short (1.5 or 1.6 meters tall), diocefalous skull (longer than wider head), sunk forehead and nose and Negroid features, based on the opening of the nasal fossae. Furthermore, they also deduce that they lived mostly in the open air, in primitive huts, and that they used the caves as occasional shelter and graves where they put the corpses in sitting position with their backs leaning against the wall, covered by ornaments and accompanied by domestic animals such as the pig, as was the general custom in all Europe in the Neolithic Period.

To sum up, those people were hunters and craftsmen more than warriors. Although some of their necklaces and bracelets were made of shells from some mollusks, it can be stated that there were not sailors, neither did they use baits or other fishing tools to get food from the sea. This is a relevant and strange detail since they undoubtedly live close to the sea shore.