# Year-round hourly temperature and humidity sensor readings from arid caves, Judean Desert, Israel

## TL;DR

This paper presents detailed temperature and humidity data from twelve caves in Israel's Judean Desert, collected over a year to study cave environments and their impact on archaeological records.

## Contribution

The study introduces a comprehensive, high-resolution dataset combining climate, speleological, and archaeological data from caves in three climate zones.

## Key findings

- Hourly temperature and humidity data were collected from twelve natural karstic caves over a year.
- The dataset includes detailed speleological and archaeological information for each cave.
- The data provide insights into microclimatic conditions affecting preservation of ancient material in caves.

## Abstract

Monitoring microclimatic conditions in underground environments is crucial for understanding chemical and biological processes occurring in caves and their effect on archaeological, palaeontological, and palaeobotanical records. The Israel Cave Climate Project (ICCP) dataset provides high-resolution microclimatic data from twelve caves across three climate zones — Desert, Steppe, and Mediterranean — measured during 2019–2021 using a uniform protocol. All twelve are natural karstic caves containing diverse, rich, and typically multi-period archaeological records. Within each cave, hourly air temperature and relative humidity measurements were recorded over a year, and these data are presented here in full. The physical and speleological characteristics of the studied caves and the content and nature of their archaeological records are also detailed. The combined high-resolution datasets, incorporating speleological, climatological, and archaeological records, provide unparalleled raw data valuable for studying cave environments, particularly cave archaeology, site formation processes, and preservation and conservation of ancient material and bioarchaeological records.