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| Two sunstones found in Vasagorda
Researchers have solved the mystery of why ancient people threw carved stones en masse into a ditch and then buried them.
Thousands of years ago, people on what is now the Danish island of Bornholm threw hundreds of mysteriously carved stones into a ditch and then buried them. The purpose of these ancient stones, also known as “sun stones,” and the reasons for their mass throwing into the ditches remained a kind of mystery that scientists could not solve for a long time. But now everything has changed, writes Science Alert.
In a new study, scientists from the University of Copenhagen examined ancient ice cores extracted from Greenland to find the answer. About 4 years ago, Earth experienced a major volcanic eruption—one so powerful it could have blocked out the Sun.
According to study co-author Rune Iversen, an archaeologist, he and his colleagues have long known that the Sun was the focus of early agricultural cultures in northern Europe. These communities cultivated the land and depended on the Sun for their crops. If at some point the Sun had almost completely disappeared due to stratospheric haze for extended periods, it would have been a disaster for local communities. As a result, ancient people resorted to sacrificing “sunstones” in an attempt to bring back much-needed sunlight.
Sunstones have been discovered in large quantities at an archaeological site on Bornholm. Archaeologists believe that the site was a religious complex between 3 and 500 BC. More specifically, it is considered a place of sun worship, as the entrances to the complex align with the sun during the solstices.
During the excavation, scientists unearthed more than 600 whole or fragmented “sunstones” buried in ditches next to a dam that runs through the site. Typically, the “sunstones” were palm-sized, flat, and some had engraved lines radiating from the Sun.
According to Iversen, such painstaking carving required incredible effort and a huge amount of time, and therefore could not be empty. Archaeologists have suggested that the purpose of creating the "sun stones" was probably spiritual and related to the Sun, fertility and growth. Scientists believe that ancient people stacked them in ditches that form part of a powerful fence along with the remains of feasts in the form of animal bones, broken clay vessels and flint objects.
The accumulation of these rocks in time and space suggests a purpose or event. Iversen and his colleagues believe they have identified what the event might have been, using an ice core extracted from the Greenland ice sheet. The scientists examined the sample and found significant amounts of sulfate—a sign of a volcanic eruption, since the emissions from this event settle on the ice sheet and are then buried under subsequent layers of ice.
Annual layers of sediment from Germany, known as varves, indicate two periods of low sunlight, one of which significantly occurred around 2900 BC. And data from annual rings of Scots pine trees in the western United States show very thin rings around the same time period, which is associated with very cold, dry conditions.
Previous studies have shown that large enough eruptions can cause widespread problems for several years. Such periods are characterized by cold snaps, low sunlight, crop failures and subsequent famine. Iversen and his team believe that in an attempt to cope with the consequences of a large-scale volcanic eruption, ancient people sacrificed sunstones. In this way, they probably tried to protect themselves from further climate change.
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