First mentioned in 1863 by the Austrian geographer Arnold Schmidl, who made some observations and the first map of the cave,[1] it was later explored by the Romanian scientist and speleologist Emil Racoviță between 1921 and 1923,[1] who mentioned it and its origin in his 1927 work Speologia (Speleology). The ice cave was formed 3,500 years ago, during the glaciations, when these mountains were covered by snow and ice.[2] The exact date when the cave was first discovered by humans is unknown.[1]