Wookey Hole Caves to 1874 by William Boyd Dawkins, who moved to Somerset to study classics with the vicar of Wookey. On hearing of the discovery of bones by local workmen he led excavations in the area of the hyena den. His work led to the discovery of the first evidence for the use by Palaeolithic man in the Caves of the Mendip Hills. Middle Paleolithic tools have been found in association with butchered bones with a radiocarbon age of around 41,000 years. Herbert E. Balch continued the work from 1904 to 1914, when he led excavations of the entrance passage (1904–1915), Witch's
Wookey Hole Caves resurgences. In particular, the passages in the 20th chamber are interpreted as a former Vauclusian spring, the waters of which once surfaced in the Ebbor Gorge. It is uncertain whether that was the original rising or whether it formed when the main rising at Wookey was blocked. The current resurgence is located close to the base of the Dolomitic Conglomerate at the head of a short gorge formed by headward erosion with subsequent cavern collapse. The morphology of the passages is determined by the rock strata in which they are formed. The streamway in the outer part of the cave