Sinuous Stone-Age snake sculpture unearthed in Finland

 

The unique, 4,000-year-old wooden artefact was discovered last year at Järvensuo I, a site in southwest Finland that encompasses a stretch of peat and mud, according to an article published in the journal Antiquity. 

The 21-inch-long snake figurine was found roughly a foot and a half down in a peat layer at the site, lying alone on its side. Its features were carefully carved from a stick, and the artist took care to incorporate the sinuous curves of the branch to serpentine effect.

In an interview with National Geographic, Satu Kavisto, an archaeologist at Finland’s University of Turku and a lead author of the paper, described how the discovery of the unassuming artefact “gave us all shivers.”

“We were stunned,” she recalls.

The researchers note that the wooden snake figurine is a unique find for Neolithic northern Europe. While snakes fashioned from wood, bone, amber, or clay have been occasionally found between the eastern Baltic and the Ural Mountains, they are less common than figures of other creatures, such as waterfowl or elk.