Posted on 10/04/2007 8:12:12 AM PDT by blam
Archaeologists stumble on sensational find
4 October 2007
Prokuplje -- Serbian archaeologists found evidence of the what could be the oldest metal workshop in all of Europe.
According to National Museum archaeologist Dušan Šljivar, experts found a “copper chisel and stone ax at a location near Prokuplje in which the foundation has proven to be 7,500 years old, leading us to believe that it was one of the first places in which metal weapons and tools were made in prehistory.”
Archaeologists hope that this find in southern Serbia will prove the theory that the metal age began a lot earlier than it was believed to have, Šljivar told Beta news agency. He leads the team of archaeologists that have been investigating the site over the past decade.
Šljivar said that this finding, along with 40 similarly valuable ones before it, among which there were more parts of metal tools and weapons, as well as a smelter and furnace, prove that man on this territory began working with metal more than 5,000 years before the new era.
Prokuplje Museum archaeologist Julka Kuzmanović-Cvetković said that the site “shows that the people living on our territory started a civilization that presented the basics of the technological revolution.”
“We want to prove that the site was a metal works centre in the central part of the Balkans,” she said.
The Ministry of Culture has set aside some EUR 12,500 for this year's excavation at the site near Prokuplje, called Pločnik.
Šljivar said that these funds have enabled experts to investigate with more detail the 25 square meters and find new specimens.
Pločnik was uncovered accidentally in 1927 while the Niš-Priština railway was being built and has been actively investigated with great interest since 1996 by Serbian and international experts.
GGG Ping.
Article mentions one metal tool. Were others found and not included in the article? Maybe a copper chisel was good for something seventy five years ago but I wonder what they did with it.
Old day labor site.
If the site was a smithy there should be a great deal more evidence on the site than one copper chisel.
This may be a poor translation or the archaeologist may have a poor grasp of English but a scientist saying “we want to prove” bothers me. Perhaps it would be better to say we expect to prove or it is our hypothesis that this site was a metal works centre in the central part of the Balkans.
I know it is anal of me:)
someone dropped a cheap copper chisel into an old post hole, and 75 years later, someone digs it up.
“...this finding, along with 40 similarly valuable ones before it, among which there were more parts of metal tools and weapons,...”
Apparently there were other tools, just not complete ones. No mention of what kind of tools, either. Typical.
Not at all. The "we want to prove" is a tactic used by some of the current "scientists" working on things such as global warming. It is contrary to a scientific approach.
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We want to prove that the site was a metal works centre
***I don’t like to see bias becoming part of the archaeology repertoire.
I don't either. These guys are just trying to make prehistory.
Neat, thanks for the link.
Comment #9 ping
With this exciting find dated around 7500 years ago, I wonder if it dates before or after the eruption of Mt. Mazama (Crater Lake). This eruption left a crater 6 miles in diameter, compared with Pinitubo’s 3 mile diameter crater. Cubed this would mean about 16 times as much atmosphere disrupting dust causing weird world-wide weather. And it was also much more in the Northern Hemisphere. I have theorized that this event may have led to weird weather that was a source for some of the flood legends. Remember our own 500 year flood in the Mississippi watershed. If my theory is correct, this could have really pulled the plug on promising developing civilizations of that period. Food shortages, raids, warfare, destruction and all that stuff.
Incidently, wasn’t a large copper implement found with the Iceman at about 5000 years ago?
A copper axe and I've read that that discover moved the 'Copper Age' back by 1,000 years.
Oetzi, 5,300 years old.
If all the implements were copper then that marke what is clalled in the books, the Chalcolithic Age. It seems that “copper” is hard for archaeologists to say.
dig more and they might find a tupperware dish
very good.
Metal tools of any kind had to be on the expensive side to own in those days.
I’ve always wondered if having such things left laying around long enough to get buried with junk items and debris points to a raid or other sort of calamitous site destruction.
“Remember our own 500 year flood in the Mississippi watershed.”
Where is that on the timeline in comparison with the Anastazi?
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