Early excavations of the Robin Hood Cave were carried out by Professor Sir William Boyd Dawkins, who wrote several papers on his findings.

Mello discovered the decorated rib at the back of the western chamber in the Robin Hood Cave in Creswell Crags.

[5] Dawkins described it as "the head and fore quarters of a horse incised on a smoothed and rounded fragment of rib, cut short off at one end and broken at the other.

Similar accusations were made against a Machairodus or sabre-toothed cat tooth found at the same time, and equally singular among the many thousands of animal remains excavated at the site (now acknowledged as authentic).

In the 1920s, three further fragments claimed as showing engraved animals were found, but these are less widely accepted, and might be wholly caused by natural means, such as the action of roots.