People have been living on and off at Meadowcroft Rock Shelter for up to 19,000 years, placing it firmly among the oldest sites of human habitation in the Americas.

The site was well-ventilated, spacious, high enough to be safe from flooding, and set on the shores of Cross Creek, leading one excavating archaeologist to describe it as "a late-Pleistocene Holiday Inn." Today, the National Historic Landmark comes complete with tours and multiple interpretive villages.

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Read on to discover more amazing places to explore the world's ancient civilizations

Revealed: The USA’s most intriguing ancient ruins