Declared a Unesco World Heritage Site for their palaeontological significance, these caves yielded the famous 3.3-million-year-old Taung skull, which belonged to a humanoid known as Australopithecus africanus . In the Historic Cave, chief Makapan and 1000-plus followers were besieged for a month in 1854 by Paul Kruger and the Voortrekkers. You must prebook visits to the site, 23km northeast of town; the guide also speaks French.
The fossilised remains of long-extinct animals such as the sivatherium, an offshoot of the giraffe clan, have been discovered in the caves, which are littered with fossils and bones.
