The Great Pyramid of Europe

Archeologists in Bosnia have unearthed part of what they believe is a pyramid fully a third taller than the Great Pyramid of Giza. The find, in Bosnia’s Visoko Valley, is under a large hill long thought to be natural.

How did the world’s largest pyramid come to be located in a land long thought to be a backwater of the ancient world? Who built it? When? Why? Archeologists still haven’t figured it out, but oh, will they have fun pondering the questions.

This is fascinating to me. I’ve recently become interested in lesser-known ancient civilizations. Not so much hunter-gatherer cultures, but true city-building civilizations, such as the one that built Cahokia and Etowah right here in the United States, or the one centered around Teotihuacán in Mexico. Although they interest me for many reasons, if nothing else the ruined cities of failed empires are a reminder that the march of civilization does not always go forward, and that humanity’s lordship over nature is perhaps not as firm we might suppose. In these days of nuclear weapons, peak oil and global warming that’s a lesson we dare not forget.

Tags: environment science