Bulgaria’s archaeological summer heats up
Bulgaria’s archaeological summer, just like the meteorological one, promises to be very hot.
In Sarafovo, near Bourgas on the Black Sea coast, the continuing archaeological excavations uncovered the ruins of a Roman farm and a chapel with a holy spring.
The head of the dig, Dr Liudmil Vagalinski of the National Archaeological Institute at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, said that the spring was filling up with sweet water, a mere few metres from the sea shore.
Last month the ruins nearby were examined, having been uncovered by the crashing waves in the big February 2012 sea storm. These ruins were presumed to be a sixth to fourth century BCE dwelling. They turned out to be the walls of a much older temple. Archaeologists have yet to date it more precisely, but it is most likely from the ninth to eighth century BCE.
Vagalinski said that the site had been revered as a holy place and both the newly uncovered Christian chapel, as well as the older temple, were built because of the spring.
Samples of the water have been taken and sent to a laboratory to test its properties.
A bit further south along the coast, near Sozopol, a pot of 225 well-preserved bronze coins was found.
It was found near the necropolis of ancient Apollonia, but outside a grave. The coins had been minted in fourth century BCE and 75 of them are of high nominal value. On one side is an anchor, typical for the town at that time (one currently is depicted on Sozopol’s coat of arms) and on the other side, the head of the town’s patron Apollo.
The archaeologists believe that this was not a funeral gift, but a treasure hoard.
Photo: bearcatroc/sxc.hu
