The most mysterious ancient artifact ever discovered
So far, thousands of artifacts have been found in the votive pits located at Sanxingdui Ancient Site. But the statue that was discovered this summer in Pit No. 8 is more mysterious and strange than all of them.
Faradid: The ancient site of Sanxingdui in Sichuan province of China is one of the richest and most mysterious ancient sites in the world, which has been the place of discovery of special and extraordinary works since 1986.
Archaeologists consider the works of this site to belong to the ancient Shu government. The date of formation of this government is probably 5000 years ago and the discovered works from it are more than 3000 years old.
The special feature of this ancient site is the presence of offering pits; Pits where gold, bronze, jade and other types of artefacts have been found. To date, about 14,000 3,000-year-old artifacts have been found in the numerous pits in this ancient site.
Excavations in this site continue continuously. But one of the most interesting discoveries in this site happened this past summer. During the exploration of one of the pits known as Pit No. 8, many bronze objects such as masks and statues were found, one of which is an amazing statue of a legendary creature.
This statue is about one meter long, one meter high and weighs 150 kilograms. This is the largest and most complete animal sculpture ever found at this site. This statue shows an animal with a horn on its head and a tree carved on its chest. On the horn of the beast is a small statue of a human who seems to be trying to restrain the beast.
(This small human statue is placed on the animal's horn)
Zhao Hao, a member of the excavation team, said: "The tree carved on the animal's chest could be a sign of the worship of the sacred tree by the ancient people living in this area, or that the sacred tree was a symbol of divine presence for them."
(This dragon head is another example of dozens of works discovered in Pit No. 8)
Zhu Feng of Shanghai University says: "The construction method, shape and iconography, as well as the content of the artifacts found at this site are very complex and rich, and they change our previous understanding of ancient bronze artifacts."
