6,000-Year-Old Cranial Amulet Discovered in Kozareva Mogila Prehistoric Settlement near Bulgaria’s Black Sea Coast

1/9. The newly discovered, sixth cranial skull amulet from the Kozareva Mogila settlement near Bulgaria’s Pomorie. Photo: TV grab from BNT

A round amulet made out of a human skull has been discovered during the 2016 archaeological excavations of the Kozareva Mogila (“Goat Mound") prehistoric settlement near Bulgaria’s Black Sea resort of Pomorie.

The prehistoric cranial amulet from the 5th millennium BC is the sixth of its kind to have been found by archaeologists so far since the Kozareva Mogila settlement was first excavated in 1991.

The archaeological settlement near the town of Kableshkovo, Pomorie Municipality, in Southeast Bulgaria, has been researched by the team of Assoc. Prof. Petya Georgieva from Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski", reports the 24 Chasa daily.

It is said to be especially interesting because its preserved Chalcolithic (Aeneolithic, Copper Age) structures and necropolis keep shedding new light on life in Southeast Europe in the 5th millennium BC.

Not unlike the five similar finds, the newly discovered cranial amulet from Kozareva Mogila was made from the top of a human skull, i.e. the frontal bone and the parietal bones, has a round shape, and a hole in the middle.

Georgieva is quoted as saying that the human skull “rondellas" (meaning “washers", as they are referred to in Bulgarian, because of their resemblance to the respective machine hardware) have not been rare finds in European archaeology. [...] Archaeology in Bulgaria