Скачать или смотреть 24th January 1890: Shigir Idol, the oldest wooden sculpture in the world, discovered in Russia

The prehistoric sculpture, which is twice as old as the pyramids, was found during gold mining operations at the Shigir peat bog near present-day Yekaterinburg. Peat frequently preserved organic material, and in this case the waterlogged conditions had protected the wood from decay for thousands of years. The idol was recovered in fragments from a depth of around four metres in an area where other prehistoric artefacts had already been discovered.

The sculpture was carved from a single larch tree trunk and is estimated to have stood over five metres tall, though only 2.8 metres survives today. Its surface is covered with geometric patterns, zigzags, and lozenges, along with a series of stylised human faces carved in relief and topped with a head with a face with eyes, nose, and mouth.

Early interpretations struggled to place the Shigir Idol within a known cultural framework. Initial estimates suggested an age of several thousand years, but it was not until the advent of radiocarbon analysis that an age of around 9,500 years old was proposed. Further testing in subsequent years pushed this date back even further, to approximately 11,500 years before present. This places its creation in the Mesolithic period, shortly after the end of the last Ice Age, making it the oldest surviving wooden sculpture in the world.

The age of the Shigir Idol challenged long-standing assumptions about the complexity of hunter-gatherer societies in northern Eurasia. Its scale, technical execution, and abstract iconography suggested a sophisticated symbolic culture capable of transmitting shared meanings across generations, though no definitive interpretation of its purpose or meaning has been agreed upon.