6,000-Year-Old Mega Temple Unearthed in Ukraine

Achaeologists in Ukraine have unearthed a 6,000-year-old temple site near the ancient settlement of Nebelivka, roughly 160 miles south of Kiev, by digging up a 60-by-21-meter site believed to be one of the oldest "mega-structures" in human history.

Sci-News reports that the ancient site belonged to the Trypillian culture, which lasted from approximately 5,400-2,700 B.C. and extended from the Carpathian piedmont to the Black Sea. The culture was complex, boasting early advancements in metallurgy, pottery and textiles.

According to researcher Mikhail Videyko, the temple was likely two stories tall, the largest of its kind on the site, and may have been the "center of a complex plan" as the "central temple of the whole village community." Each single-habitation Trypillian settlement appears to have been burnt to the ground after about 60 to 80 years of continuous occupation for reasons unknown to current researchers, including the temple site.

Here are a few shots of the complex, along with some representations of what it once looked like:
"The temple was a two-story building made of wood and clay surrounded by a galleried courtyard, five rooms were on the first floor and raised family altars made of clay were on the ground floor," Videyko wrote. "Its construction required labor commensurate with the construction of several dozen ordinary houses. Its plan and some features of this structure find analogies in temples from the 5th to 4th millennia B.C. known from excavations in Anatolia and Mesopotamia."
mic.com...

Klik For more, It seemed the Great Mother Goddess was at work here, it was massive but why did they burn and rebuild every 60 to 80yrs was it connected to Halley's Comet?? I am just guessing nothing in the article mentioned that at all but it seemed a nice fit if one add or subtract couple decade either way in the dating method.

Perhaps the time period 60 to 80 years is related to the time it takes for tress to grow. The burning would be related to destroying any bugs or insects that had taken up residence in the timber of the building.

originally posted by: stormcell
Perhaps the time period 60 to 80 years is related to the time it takes for tress to grow. The burning would be related to destroying any bugs or insects that had taken up residence in the timber of the building.

Hmmm good answer sometimes I need to look down or in-front before looking up.

a reply to: Spider879

maybe the life span of a ruler, old king dies, burn his kingsdom down, new one builds his own.

a reply to: Spider879

Female figurines do not necessarily indicate worship of a Mother Goddess or a matriarchal society. They may be votives designed to work sympathetic magic, and even if the society worshiped a goddess or goddesses, it does not mean that women necessarily ran the society. Still, it is a remarkably sophisticated culture for that era in Eastern Europe/Western Asia.

originally posted by: hounddoghowlie
a reply to: Spider879

maybe the life span of a ruler, old king dies, burn his kingsdom down, new one builds his own.

Been known to happen but in the this case it would seem to be a Kingnett

Why call it a temple? It was a dancehall and festival hall. They sold a bunch of clay knickknacks to the women in the craft store along with a collection of paints and some knitting supplies. The Bingo hall was on the second floor. Wedding receptions were held there occasionally.

Oh gee, what I am saying is almost as speculative as calling it a temple where they worshiped goddesses..

Mayan's also rebuit on a regular schedule:

It has been suggested that, in conjunction to the Maya Long Count Calendar, every fifty-two years, or cycle, temples and pyramids were remodeled and rebuilt. It appears now that the rebuilding process was often instigated by a new ruler or for political matters, as opposed to matching the calendar cycle. However, the process of rebuilding on top of old structures is indeed a common one. Most notably, the North Acropolis at Tikal seems to be the sum total of 1,500 years of architectural modifications.
en.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: Spider879
Happy new year Spider, and to all ats'ers

thanks for posting that,
What i find interesting is the lack of metallic artifacts, as this region was pivotal to the spread of early metallurgy.
The cucuteni/trypillian culture was one of the early pivotal cultures of the black sea coast, they linked the balkan early metal use with cultures furthe east.
The 60-80 year burn down cycle is puzzleing, it wasnt due to a change of leadership, they had a classes society, as far as we know.

These settlements underwent periodical acts of destruction and re-creation, as they were burned and then rebuilt every 60–80 years. Some scholars[who?] have theorized that the inhabitants of these settlements believed that every house symbolized an organic, almost living, entity. Each house, including its ceramic vases, ovens, figurines and innumerable objects made of perishable materials, shared the same circle of life, and all of the buildings in the settlement were physically linked together as a larger symbolic entity. As with living beings, the settlements may have been seen as also having a life cycle of death and rebirth

en.wikipedia.org...

The earliest writing also appears during their tenure, the vinca script.

Beginning in 1875 up to the present, archaeologists have found more than a thousand Neolithic era clay artifacts that have examples of symbols similar to the Vinča script scattered widely throughout south-eastern Europe. This includes the discoveries of what appear to be barter tokens, which were used as an early form of currency. Thus it appears that the Vinča or Vinča-Turdaş script is not restricted to just the region around Belgrade, which is where the Vinča culture existed, but that it was spread across most of southeastern Europe, and was used throughout the geographical region of the Cucuteni-Trypillian culture. As a result of this widespread use of this set of symbolic representations, historian Marco Merlini has suggested that it be given a name other than the Vinča script, since this implies that it was only used among the Vinča culture around the Pannonian Plain, at the very western edge of the extensive area where examples of this symbolic system have been discovered. Merlini has proposed naming this system the Danube Script, which some scholars have begun to accept.[54] However, even this name change would not be extensive enough, since it does not cover the region in Ukraine, as well as the Balkans, where examples of these symbols are also found. Whatever name is used, however (Vinča script, Vinča-Tordos script, Vinča symbols, Danube script, or Old European script), it is likely that it is the same system.[54]

It is a fascinating period in Eurasian development

NVM

a reply to: punkinworks10
Happy New Year Punkinworks
Eastern Europe and the Black sea region have some interesting surprises is the script original or derivative of another ,you have added to my knowledge today for I never heard of the script

a reply to: Spider879

80 years is complete cycle in modern times. Each generation sees about 20 years of "power" or primary control.

See: Strauss-Howe Generational Theory

Ancients seem to have had a proclivity for observing a 70 year cycle. You can likely find some stuff online regarding that as well (Dwyer...i think). The number 7 relates to divinity, while the number 10 relates to man. The connection to the Sabbath is obvious in Jewish custom. However, I would be shocked if the Israelites were the creators of this custom.

Cometary passage is another viable idea, as you mentioned.

ETA: Chronology Of The Jubilees

A bit woo....but there ya have it.

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Thanks BigFurry will check your link later

How about 60-80 years as the time it took for the wooden buildings to rot enough to become useless?

a reply to: Spider879, BFFT, and Sunwolf
Sunwolf,
you hit the nail on the the head, since they were using waddle and daub construction, sticks woven together and covered with mud, to make walls, id bet that 60-80 years was aslong as you could keep a domecile going. It would eventually bet infested with insects, the interal twig structure would rot to the point beyond repair.
Spider and BFFT, there might also be a celestial connection. Read the work of Marie Agnes Courty regarding periodic deposition of amorphorous carbon on early bronze age sites.
This isnt the paper i was looking for but its in the same vein.
www.sis-group.org.uk...

At Tel Leilan ,in northern syria, Wies and courty found evidence of periodic burning episodes. The are towns would burn down every few decades, and be rebuilt. They also found that there were several instances of the landscape being covered by a layer of "amorphorous carbon", that the local population then used as fuel in the years following the events.

It is starting to look like that the earth was literally pummeled by the breaking up of the Taurid progenitor, after the end of the ice age.
From Bob Kobres page,

Fred Whipple, the astronomer who theorized in 1950 the now proven structure of comets, calculates that the night time Taurids have been a feature for 5,000 years. It now takes Earth about three months (mid-September to mid-December) to traverse this band of debris. Earlier in its history, as the progenitor of comet Encke was creating it, this debris ring had to have been more dense. As Earth passed through the mess, it no doubt collected a considerable amount of dust. The night time Taurids are known for frequent bolide activity. Large, vaporizing meteoroids (bolides) in an atmosphere loaded with comet dust will produce unusual visual effects. Refraction, reflection, and possibly secondary emission come into play as a sizable object splashes into an aerosol laden atmosphere compressing molecules of gas against motes of dust in its bow-shock wave until--BOOM -- the object vaporizes, illuminating the multiple layers of compression separated gas and debris. From the ground this might look as if a god threw a pebble in the sky pond. Quite likely a large sector of the sky would be filled with such phenomena. Though the intensity would vary from year to year our ancestors, no doubt, expected a rather disconcerting light show on an annual basis.

Striking evidence for this contention comes from well-preserved Neolithic observatories in Ireland. Martin Brennan (1983), who spent over a decade investigating these structures, published a wonderful documentation of their features. Though he assumes them to be a product of solar worship, his research is thorough and includes mythological references to these megalithic works--most intriguing from the standpoint of this discussion is Tara. Brennan states that:


Tara lies 10 miles southwest of Newgrange and, like Newgrange, it is steeped in ancient myth and tradition. It has always been associated with Samhain, the Celtic observance of the year's turning in November, and this event is well documented. Mythologically, the mound also has associations with the Tuatha De Danann, or the "Lords of Light." They arrive from the air and cast a darkness over the sun for three days.

This neolithic observatory is aligned, according to Brennan, to cross-quarter days November 8 and February 4. The carved stone within this megalithic structure depicts concentric circles similar to the earth works evident in the aerial photograph of Tara shown.

Incorporating astronomical evidence of a recent giant short period comet into our attempt to understand past cultures is essential for an objective interpretation.

abob.libs.uga.edu...


And BBFT, you mentioned the number seven and how it is very prominent in ancient mythology, "The seven Judges of Hell" from the Lament of Akad, The seven seals of hell from the hebrew tradition, among the uto aztecans, the seven caves of creation, and among the penutians of CA, the seven caves of the great chiefs. In another recent thread some one mentions the seven celestial entities pulling the sun, from vedic texts.
I think that there were originally seven major fragments of the taurid progenitor and their yearly appearance had a great deal of influence on early cultures.