In July and August, the North-Western archaeological expedition, with the support of the student archaeological group 'Chronos', conducted both surface and underwater surveys to locate possible Stone Age settlements in the valley of the Serteika River in the north of the Smolensk region.
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| Credit: Fontanka |
During the course of the research, archaeologists discovered the remains of the wooden pile house of the fifth millennium BC buried in the river's mud and numerous architectural details were recorded.
Oars and fragments of oars, wooden utensils, bone and flint tools, as well as numerous pottery fragments were found in and around the house. The most striking of these is a cup with depicting a snake.
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| Credit: Fontanka |
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"Among the finds made during the excavations of the pile house, a special place is occupied by amber ornaments, which were made by craftsmen in the southeastern Baltic region and which reached the territory of today's Smolensk region, probably as a result of trade", explains Andrey Mazurkevich, the expedition chief, and senior researcher of the Department of Archaeology of Eastern Europe and Siberia of the State Hermitage Museum.
A settlement believed to date to the third millennium BC was also identified along the banks of the river.
Source: Fontanka [trsl. TANN, August 17, 2019]
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