Monday, September 28, 2015

Neolithic pit oven recreated and tested

Archaeologists working at Prastio Mesorotsos in Cyprus have recreated a Neolithic pit oven.

A 9,000-year-old barbecue pit was recently discovered at Prastio Mesorotsos, a site in the Diarizos Valley outside of Paphos, which has been almost continuously occupied from the Neolithic era to the present. It took three years of excavations before archaeologists from the University of Edinburgh got to the bottom of the stone-lined, ash-covered pit, and only last summer could they say with some certainty that they were looking at an ancient oven. But the pit was so big — about 8 feet (2.5 meters) across and 3 feet (1 meter) deep — that Andrew McCarthy, director of the expedition, wasn’t sure if cooking in it would actually work.

[Full story]

Story: Megan Gannon, Live Science | Photo: Andrew McCarthy

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