They are raising funds for the archaeological research of the Varna Chalcolithic Necropolis

The Varna Regional History Museum relies on donations to finance the study of the Varna Chalcolithic Necropolis during the current archaeological season, the institution announced, quoted by BTA. The reason is that there are no funds for this in the budget of the Municipality of Varna for 2024, and the state funding is not sufficient to achieve the goals set by the team, explained the head of the site, chief assistant. Dr. Vladimir Slavchev. He recalled that last year about 45 thousand BGN state support and 50 thousand BGN were received from the Municipality of Varna and this allowed two months of work for the archaeologists in October and November. This year we are applying for the same amount from the central budget, but the prices of materials and services have been increased, as well as the minimum wage, which means that they will most likely approve fewer projects or work with smaller amounts, he said. Slavchev. He specified that it is of great importance for the Varna archaeologists to have a longer period for field work, because the contract for the management of the terrain of the state-owned site expires in 2026, and they are trying to complete the excavations by then. so that conservation and socialization activities can follow.

The necessary amount for carrying out one month of excavations is about BGN 50 thousand. If more funds are raised, the balance will be transferred to next season’s research, the museum said. Donations related to the provision of material, transport and other means to support the activities will also be accepted.

The Varna Museum resumed the excavations of the Chalcolithic necropolis in 2021, almost half a century after the beginning and thirty years after their interruption, the institution recalled. In three seasons, until the end of 2023, an additional 26 graves were investigated.

The necropolis was discovered accidentally during excavations in the Western Industrial Zone of the city in the fall of 1972. Its research, carried out with several interruptions, had 13 seasons in the period until 1991. A total area of ​​7,500 square meters was excavated. and 301 graves were found, of which 93 were for men, 67 for women, and 47 were symbolic, without a body laid in them. The rest have been disturbed to varying degrees by later excavations, construction and agricultural activities.

The site is dated to the Late Stone-Copper Age (second half of the 5th millennium BC) and reveals the picture of a rich society of members with diverse social and material status, with a complex organization and established power structures. With the variety of burial practices and the huge number of finds of various materials, the Varna Chalcolithic necropolis remains the most remarkable and significant monument of prehistory not only in the Balkans and Europe, but also in the whole world, the museum points out.

Among the finds, the most interesting are the gold objects, which are more than 3 thousand in number, and their total weight exceeds 6 kg. So far for the 5th millennium BC. a similar concentration of precious metal artefacts is not known elsewhere. They were found in only 62 complexes, but the most of them are in four of the graves. Their weight and quantity several times exceed the same indicators of all synchronous gold objects found so far in the whole world.

The Varna Chalcolithic Necropolis illustrates the first stages of the birth of a class society and is a testimony to the appearance of the first civilization, which is earlier than the Sumerian and Egyptian by more than half a millennium, the team further specified and added that it is evident that in it the inhabitants of the socio-economic center of the highly developed community inhabiting the northwestern Black Sea coast in the second half of the 5th millennium BC were buried.