Willendorf II is situated on the left bank of the Danube, about 80 km west of Vienna, Austria. It is an open air site situated on an eastward facing slope about 15 meters above the Danube (appr. 230 meters above sea level), on the northern outskirts of the small village of Willendorf.
In this area the Danube runs through a narrow valley, separating the Bohemian Massif to the north, and the Dunkelsteiner Wald, the southernmost part of the massif to the south. The valley is broader north of the river, with thick loess deposits. During the building of the railway from Krems towards Grein in the early 20th century several palaeolithic sites were discovered in the loess deposits.
The only site of the Willendorf site cluster that was excavated is Willendorf II. An over 5 m long loess sequence covers the time period of about 50 000 BP to about 24 000 BP. In total, 9 cultural horizons were described, but several "intercalar layers", with a few lithics and/or bone were also present.
Very few lithics and bones are known from Layer 1, so its cultural attribution is not clear. The artefacts from Layer 2 seem to indicate Early Upper Palaeolithic affinities, which fits well with a 14C date of 41 700 BP for charcoal coming from above this layer.
The industry of Layer 3 is early Aurignacian, a 14C date of about 39 000 BP is one of the earliest ones for this technocomplex. Layer 4 is a classical Aurignacian, about 32 000 years old.
Layers 5 to 9 belong to the Gravettian technocomplex, and are dated to about 30 000 (Layer 5) to 24 000 years (Layer 9).