"Incredibly exciting find": Archaeologists dig up more than 2,500-year-old relic
Created: 2022-12-19 13:21
By: Tanja Kipke
In icy weather, employees from the Office for Excavations and Documentation BfAD Heyse uncovered the remains of a prehistoric pantry.
© Christian Schuster/ District of Würzburg (Merkur.de collage)
Archaeologists uncovered the remains of settlements in Lower Franconia from the times 800 to 600 BC.
The find causes great joy in the district of Würzburg.
Gaukönigshofen - They dug for almost three months for traces of history.
The work was worth it.
Archaeologists have unearthed relics more than 2,500 years old in Gaukönigshofen (Landkries Würzburg).
Remains of settlements from two different ages have been unearthed.
"This is an incredibly exciting find," said District Administrator Thomas Eberth in a statement from the district.
"We are holding thousands of years of history in our hands here."
Archaeologists recently found the oldest stone wall of its kind and the oldest quarry north of the Alps in Neuburg an der Donau.
They are about 3400 years old.
Archaeologists find in Bavaria: 2,500-year-old pantry provides information
"We came across more than 40 findings," excavation leader Ulrich Müller is quoted as saying in a statement during a tour with the district administrator.
More specifically, the team found pottery shards, animal bones that could indicate food or food waste, as well as simple stone tools and two small bronze fragments.
The arrangement of the finds suggests storage chambers that were laid out in a cone shape underground.
“What would certainly also have been found there are finds made of wood.
But of course they are no longer preserved after this time,” explains Müller.
"We once found traces of settlements from the Middle Hallstatt culture, an early Celtic period from around 800 to 600 BC." At that time, simple farmers who practiced agriculture lived there, but they already lived in solid houses made of wood and clay.
The other settlement remains can be dated to the early Middle Ages, around the eighth to tenth century, the time of the Carolingians.
“Gaukönigshofen was about a day's journey from Würzburg by the standards of the time.
So that could have been a way station for a Carolingian ruler at the time," Müller continues.
Archaeologists also unearthed a 1,400-year-old folding chair in Franconia. It was in a woman's grave - with other grave goods.
District administrator wants to make finds accessible to students
If the weather permits, the excavations in Gaukönigshofen can soon be completed.
The fun pieces are then carefully examined and archived.
"Of course, we would like to have the finds back for an exhibition after they have been recognized by the monument protection authorities," says the district administrator.
He could well imagine making the potsherds and a historical study of them accessible to schoolchildren later on.
(tkip)
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