Discovered at Hamresanden, not far from Kristiansand’s airport at Kjevik in southern Norway, the settlement has remained undisturbed for 5,500 years, buried under three feet of sand.
“We expected to find an 'ordinary' Scandinavian Stone Age site, badly preserved and small. Instead, we discovered a unique site, buried under a thick sand layer,” lead archaeologist Lars Sundström, of the Museum of Cultural History at the University in Oslo, told Discovery News.
Digging about 80 meters (262 feet) from the shoreline, in the headland formed by the river Topdalselva and the North Sea, Sundström’s team first unearthed what appears to be the remains of a walled structure.
“So far, we have evidence of a 30-meter (98.5-foot) bank made from sand mixed with clay and silt. We believe that this bank has been shoveled up against a wooden wall in order to support it," Sundström said.
The structure, whose length continues beyond the limits of the excavation trenches, is made of large stones.
"They must have been carried from some distance, since the area is devoid of stone naturally," Sundström said.
Most likely a seasonal aggregation site conveniently located between a river and the sea, the settlement is filled with shards of beaker-shaped vessels, many of which could be restored to the original state.
Read more at Discovery News
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