Speleology

Speleology or Cave Exploration is the scientific study of caves and related topics, and especially karst features. It is derived from the Greek word σπήλαιον (spḗlaion, cave) and λογία (logía, study of). The term was coined by Émile Rivière in 1890 and has become an international term, with slightly different spellings.

There are several terms which are connected, and which are often mixed up. As caves are defined as natural underground voids, speleology explores natural spaces, not artificial spaces like mines and cellars. Exploring abandoned mines is a different thing, generally called mine exploration, as well as exploring other artificial subterranea which is today called urban exploration. Speleology is describing and researching the mechanisms of cave formation, which is in a way a subsection of geology, as caves are geological structures. On the other hand speleology requires chemical and physical methods, has a special section for cave biology, is closely related to archaeology. Other aspects of speleology are geography, surveying, palaeontology, mineralogy, and of course engineering the special equipment. A famous French caver, Norbert Casteret, once said: "speleology is sports in service of science". This shows, that practical speleology is a lot of sports, climbing, abseiling, and squeezing through narrow passages.

However, there is one important thing about the difference between "speleology" and "caving". Caving, which means climbing and crawling, is a part of speleology, exploring new caves and surveying are scientific work, but there is a border where the cave tour does not bring any knowledge. The famous Austrian speleologist Hubert Trimmel who once defined cave exploration without scientifically usable results is tourism. There are sometimes even (derogatory) terms for this kind of activity: cave tourism, cave trekking, or spelunking. Wikipedia defines Caving as "the recreational pastime of exploring wild cave systems. In contrast, speleology is the scientific study of caves and the cave environment."

showcaves.com is dedicated to tourist use of underground sites. This does not include spelunking, and we do not support this, we do not give locations of caves and only describe cave which are show caves. Caves are fragile in numerous ways, and even the scientific work has to be restricted to protect the cave. The use of a cave as sports equipment for fun is not acceptable.

Speleology was originally a purely descriptive science, and the recording and classification of phenomena is still an important field today. In particular, the evaluation of dripstones as climate archives has made speleology famous in recent decades. But computer simulations of solution processes that lead to the formation of cave systems or the deposition of dripstones have also advanced science. But we want to start with classification and present the most common ways of classifying caves below.