For thousands of year , Baltic amber- otherwise known as succinite - has been recognized as the finest in the world , and has been sought after for use in jewellery since Romanic sentence . Despite other gold deposits exist across Europe , ancient people from far and panoptic were keen to get their hired man on the Baltic bling , and new research reveals that the material was transport to the most westward region of the continent more than 5,000 year ago .
In a new subject , researchers key out the find of a single succinite bead in a grave in Catalonia , Spain . Dated between 3634 and 3363 BCE , the sepulture site in the Cova del Frare cave served as the final resting billet for at least 12 prehistorical person and represents the earliest known visual aspect of Balticamberin the Iberian peninsula .
Using a technique called Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy , the research worker were capable to confirm that the bead ’s book of facts spectra disagree importantly from that of Iberian gold deposits , yet matched with Baltic amber .
In astatement , study author Mercedes Murillo - Barroso enounce the discovery “ allows us to say with confidence that the arrival of Baltic amber on the Iberian Peninsula occurred at least in the fourth millennium BC , more than a millennium earlier than we reckon , and that it was probably part of wider swap networks connect to the south of France ” .
Originating in northern Europe , Baltic amber was utilized extensively by the so - called Funnel Beaker Culture that occupied present - day Denmark , the Netherlands , Germany , and Poland in the fourth millenary BCE . Typically used to make buttons , beads , and pendants , the stuff has been identify at sites across France date back to around 5,000 year ago , with these constituting the earliest model of succinite in Western Europe prior to this work .
Within Spain , researchers had previously discovered a Baltic amber beadwork within a tomb of “ exceptional opulence ” in the Murcia neighborhood . belong to a male somebody of 35 to 40 year of years , the burial see back to between 1738 and 1534 BCE and until now had correspond the earliest confirmed instance of succinite in Iberia .
free-base on this prior discovery , historian had come to consider that Baltic amber imports commence with the so - called Bell Beaker culture , which emerged in Portugal in the third millenary BCE . Yet the Cova del Frare find shatter this tale , shew that Baltic amber was present in the Iberian peninsula well originally than previously take .
“ Despite being a single bead , this determination provides the earliest evidence for the arrival of Baltic amber to the Mediterranean and Western Europe , before the Bell Beaker phenomenon and more than a millennium earlier than traditionally thought , ” write the report authors .
Based on the old age of the beadwork , the researchers speculate that it may have pass on Spain via the ancient trade networks of the Sepulcros de Fosa culture , which grow in Catalonia during the Middle Neolithic period before disappear between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago .
The study is publish in the journalScientific Reports .
