World's Oldest Gold Object May Have Just Been Unearthed in Bulgaria | Hacker News Reader

World's Oldest Gold Object May Have Just Been Unearthed in Bulgaria

smithsonianmag.com

60 pointsranit18 comments

I even turned off request policy and noscript in attempt to see the object on that page. I was disappointed.

You can find it by clicking through to the Reuters link, or here it is directly: http://s4.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20160810&t=2&...

Thanks for the quick fix! How about a vote to change the original link to the entire Reuters article, which this is based on, instead?

http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-bulgaria-archaeology-gold-i...

Oh gosh thanks!

I was disappointed

I was riveted. Something doesn't need to be big or intricate to be hugely important.

nonbel expected to see an image of the object on the page of the submitted article. (Which was the smithsonian link.)

nonbel didn't see the image, and thought that maybe it was being blocked by their ad-blocker / etc software. nonbel turned all that off, and was disappointed that there was still no image of the object.

It seems that the ancient Thrace might be among the oldest civilization known to humanity and the current view that the cradle of modern civilization is in modern day Iraq may not be entirely correct. It should be noted that in addition to gold work and ancient art, the oldest writing in the world has also been found in this area and it is also from Thracian origin.

I hope these finds result in further study of the ancient Thracian civilization.

When the ancient Greeks came to Europe from Egypt, they found the Thrace already there. They considered the Thrace to be barbarians, as one always finds a foreigner to be a barbarian. The Greeks tried to destroy and infiltrate Thracian culture by adopting their Gods and myths and modifying them to fit within the Greek mythology. This is completely normal and happened a lot in those times.

But modern scientists and archaeologists do not have to follow this.

It is absolutely wrong to believe that all civilization came from mesopotamia to ancient egypt and then went through ancient greece and rome. These are just the guys that won a lot of the wars.

If we look around we can find that there are a lot of interesting cultures and civilizations that have had an effect on the modern world and modern Europe aside from the accepted classics.

"When the ancient Greeks came to Europe from Egypt"

As far as I know that is a fringe theory. The very early ancient Greek Minoan civilization [0] were locals. They traded with Egypt, and imported culture, which gave rise to the idea they were Egyptians, but DNA confirms they were European. [1] Culture also seems to have gone the other way as well.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoan_civilization

[1] http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-22527821

Any links on the oldest writing in the world being found in Thrace claim? It seems pretty unlikely as, to my knowledge, the Thracians of classical Greek times were completely illiterate.

There is a claim that Gradeshnitsa tablets are deciphered, but it is highly disputed as being scientific. See the references in this short wikipedia article.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gradeshnitsa_tablets

> When the ancient Greeks came to Europe from Egypt

What do you mean by this? My understanding is that the Greeks (along with all Indoeuropeans) originated north of the Black Sea?

The "oldest" and "the cradle of modern civilization" could be two different things. Perhaps the oldest failed, or at least did not influence that in mesopotamia. It would still be first, but also not be the cradle of the modern. I find it very possible that "civilization" rose and fell throughout the old world many times only to be forgotten. It wasn't easy.

There's a lot of cool, really old stuff in Bulgaria and Thrace in particular. If you take a look at a terrain map, you'll see it's the easiest way to get into Europe from the Middle East, so there have been many migrations over the millennia, and a lot of sites and objects left behind.

For example, there is a small museum in Stara Zagora that has a really well-preserved Neolithic house remains from the 6th millenium BC. The two people minding the museum also seemed somewhat surprised anyone went there and I was the only visitor for about an hour or so that day.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neolithic_Dwellings_Museum

How was the gold "processed"?

The OP asks How they were able to master the smelting of copper and gold in that short span of time?" But as I understand things you don't need to smelt gold. Find a sufficiency large nugget, which were no uncommon before we started picking them up, and you can bash the thing into shape without external heat. Bashing also probably purifies it in much the same way as iron. Perhaps all it took was someone noticing how this particular rock was soft enough to form into a shiny bead.

My assumption would be something close to the smelter shown on Primitive Technologies YouTube channel. Find the smelter video here:

https://youtu.be/VVV4xeWBIxE

This channel is fascinating. The history nerd within me finds satisfaction in every video he has recorded.

If you're ever in Varna, go to the museum!

It's usually mostly empty (who likes stuffy museums, right?), but the building is grand, and the exhibits are fascinating. And when you get to the ancient gold objects, it's difficult to imagine how astonishing the fine detail is: the degree of craftsman(woman?)ship, on such a tiny scale.

Gold is amazing material, but the artists who worked it were even more amazing.

Also be sure to visit the Roman ruins - an extensive area, pretty well maintained and informative; lots of little interesting corners. Sad to see that some stray dogs have made their burrows here... It's a shame that, for all their artistic and cultural triumphs, people are quite crappy, too.

(BTW, also check out the puppet theater - the best one outside the Czech Republic! Awesome!)

Have that found no gold artefacts at Göbekli Tepe[1], which is by some distance the oldest temple[2] (or whatever it is)?

I had an impression that there had been, but I can't find anything except the famous carvings.

I find Göbekli Tepe absolutely fascinating - it's so much older than any equivalent sites that have been found. It's 6000 years older than Stonehenge, 7000 years older than the Sumerian civilisation, and before the invention of pottery. Maybe some of the oldest dwellings at Jericho[3] are comparable, but there is nothing like the constructions of Göbekli Tepe that old at Jericho.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe

[2] http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/gobekli-tepe-the-world...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jericho#Pre-Pottery_Neolithic....

It is not surprising that the dig site is near (about 30 km) Plovdiv[1], one of the oldest continuously inhabited places in the world. It was a settlement 6000 years ago.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plovdiv

that's good they weren't trying to ban cash back then.

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