GRA conducted several seasons of inter-disciplinary investigation at Konispol Cave, near the Pävel River in the western Epirus region of southern Albania.
The final phase of work addressed questions of site formation, cave history, and environmental change through microstratigraphic study and detailed sedimentological analysis. An initial study produced a generalized cave stratigraphy that traced the broad outlines of a >4.5 m thick stratified Mesolithic through Iron Age sequence with indications of earlier (Paleolithic) habitation. Secure and well-dated artifact assemblages and features provide an opportunity to distinguish patterned site sedimentation as a function of geologic deposition, post-depositional alteration and human activity. More generally, the stratigraphic record informs on changes within the cavern as well as local environmental trends in the cave vicinity. The latter have regional paleoecological implications as well.