5000 yr old statue-menhirs found in Sardinia

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   Sardinia is known for its nuraghi ( singular: nuraghe). These stone towers ( often forming large fortress-like complexes ) were built between ca 1800 and 900 BC. 
There is also some very old ziggurat on the island of about the same age as the oldest ones in the Middle East.
Recently, a serie of broken statue-menhirs has been found dating back to ca 3000 BC.  A tentative line can be drawn to the 4th millennium BC Kemi Oba Culture in the Ukraine.

Excerpt from the article: 

The discovery of a drystone wall entirely made of broken stelae-statues in Sardinia – many carved with stylised human figures – could make the site at Cuccuru e Lai, near Samugheo, one of the most important prehistoric sanctuaries of the island.

Mauro Perra, archaeologist at the Villanovaforru Museum, said that the finding could be “as important as the Mount Prama statues”.

The broken standing stones date back to the Chalcolithic period around 3000 BCE, and were probably broken up about 70 years ago, when the wall was built.

Archaeologists began research in the area in the 1990s, when they excavated near a tomb at Paule Lutturi; then in August 2008 they found a series of statue-menhirs (standing stones carved with human traits). Finally, this month a new dig led to the discovery of about 300 pieces of broken standing stones.

Around the 3rd millennium BCE, anthropomorphic statues spread throughout Europe.

The earliest anthropomorphic stelae date to the 4th millennium BC, and are associated with the early Bronze Age Kemi Oba culture of the Crimea and adjacent steppe region, most of them are very crude stone slabs with a simple schematic protruding head and a few features such as eyes or breasts carved into the stone but around twenty specimens, known as statue menhirs, are more complex, featuring ornaments, weapons, human or animal figures.
................. 

Read  the rest here:
http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/08/2011/statue-menhirs-found-in-a-sardinian-wall

A statue-menhir similar to the Sardinian ones

Edited by Sander - 08-Oct-2011 at 16:13