Brno, April 10 (CTK) – Geologists from Brno’s Masaryk University discovered a fragment of a ceramic Venus sculpture approximately 6,500 years old in Brno and did so during surface collection, which makes the find unique, geologist Petr Gadas has told CTK.
Geologists study the raw materials for stone artefacts from the prehistoric era and sometimes also find ceramic fragments.
Gadas said he at first thought the fragment was a vessel’s handle, but was alerted by his colleague Antonin Prichystal to the fact that its shape resembled a part of a female sculpture.
The unique discovery, which was made in the autumn of 2017, is related to a settlement of the Moravian Painted Pottery Culture.
As opposed to archeologists, geologists are not allowed to dig into the ground.
“However, we know about a large part of settlements from the period when stone was worked, and we know specific locations, where it was readied for further use,” Gadas said.
The place where the fragment was found is a location of one of the workshops. What archeologists might consider a common find, is unique to the geologists, however.
The fragment is about 6.5 centimetres in both length and width and it was classified as a Venus of the Strelice type, named after the village of Strelice near Znojmo, south Moravia. The remains of these sculptures are found in a relatively extensive area and attest to agile communication and trade among the people.
