A stone age wall discovered beneath the waves off Germany’s Baltic coast may be the oldest known megastructure built by humans in Europe, researchers say.
The wall, which stretches for nearly a kilometre along the seafloor in the Bay of Mecklenburg, was spotted by accident when scientists operated a multibeam sonar system from a research vessel on a student trip about 10km (six miles) offshore.
Closer inspection of the structure, named the Blinkerwall, revealed about 1,400 smaller stones that appear to have been positioned to connect nearly 300 larger boulders, many of which were too heavy for groups of humans to have moved.
The submerged wall, described as a “thrilling discovery”, is covered by 21 metres of water, but researchers believe it was constructed by hunter-gatherers on land next to a lake or marsh more than 10,000 years ago.
While the purpose of the wall is hard to prove, scientists suspect it served as a driving lane for hunters in pursuit of herds of reindeer.
A lifetime ago I used to work in the construction field. I have every respect for the people who planned and built the pyramids. The level of coordination, resource management, engineering expertise would have rivalled the biggest projects of the modern day.
Sometimes its nice to be reminded we haven’t advanced all that far. For all the machinery and gadgetry we have today, some of the works still require the same techniques and methods used by our ancient ancestors. Like shifting heavy equipment onto its final position. Like rolling it on top of steel pipes and then using a bunch of pulleys and levers to just jimmy it to its exact angle required. For all the laser levellers we have, sometimes nothing beats a bit of clear tubing, water, string and a good eye to level a final coat of flooring.