#Exhibit of the Month

The ceramic vessel set was discovered accidentally in October 2025 in the southwestern part of the village of Bălceana, Hâncești District, approximately 1.2 km from the Lăpușnița River. The archaeological materials were recovered by the National Archaeological Agency.

The ceramic assemblage consists of a large storage vessel (pithos) with a capacity of 20 litres (h = 39.2 cm; d = 35.0 cm), decorated with a raised band below the rim; a medium-sized bowl with a capacity of 2.5 litres (h = 16.9 cm; d = 23.2 cm); a medium-sized jug with a capacity of 0.6 litres (h = 12.0 cm; d = 13.4 cm); and the base of a jar-shaped vessel.

The coarse handmade pottery was produced using the coil-building technique, by stacking and shaping coils of clay prepared from a paste tempered with crushed fired clay (grog) and sand. The vessel surfaces are uneven and covered with a yellowish-red slip featuring black patches, while the core of the vessel walls is black in colour.

The three vessels preserved intact display well-defined biconical shapes, with their maximum diameter at the middle of the body and straight or slightly oblique rims with rounded edges. Pottery of this type is characteristic of the Early Medieval cultural area of the northern and northwestern Black Sea region, dating from the 5th to the 7th centuries. East of the Dniester River, on the territory of present-day Ukraine, analogous pottery is found in Penkovka-type settlements, while in the Carpathian-Dniester region it is characteristic of settlements belonging to the Costișa-Botoșana-Hansca cultural group.

Within the Prut-Dniester region, coarse biconical pottery is generally represented by fragments and only relatively rarely by complete vessels, such as those discovered at Hansca, Dănceni, Recea, Seliște, Păhărniceni, and other sites. This type of pottery constituted an indispensable component of the local material culture during the 5th-7th centuries. In this context, the discovery at Bălceana of an almost intact set of coarse biconical vessels represents a relatively rare find of considerable scientific importance.

According to certain hypotheses, the tradition of coarse biconical pottery dating to the 5th-7th centuries originated in the North Pontic region. At the same time, it cannot be ruled out that these biconical ceramic vessels were the result of contemporary ethnocultural interactions, developing simultaneously across the vast territory extending from the Carpathian Mountains to the Dnieper River and the Seversky Donets.

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Exhibitions

“Archaeological vestiges in the Budzhak Steppe. Taraclia District”

June 24 - September 30, 2021

The National Museum of History of Moldova possesses a rich collection of archaeological remains, resulting from investigations conducted in Taraclia District from the 1970s-1980s up to this day.

At present, on the territory of the district there are known about 220 archeological sites attested near 16 localities, out of the 26 ones that are part of this administrative unit. Among the sites listed in the Archaeological Register of the Republic of Moldova there is a linear fortification (Trajan's Wall), 30 multi-layered settlements, eight flat grave fields and 181 tumulus fields. But only a part of them was investigated by archaeological excavations: four settlements (Taraclia-Gaidabul, Taraclia I, Cealîc, Balabanu I), three flat grave fields (Cealîc, Taraclia-Gaidabul, Taraclia Center) and 48 mounds (groups of mounds near Taraclia, Balabanu, Ciumai etc.).

As a result of surface research, as well as archaeological excavations, traces of habitation have been attested from the early Eneolithic era (4500-4000 BC) to the medieval and pre-modern era, the period of the late nomads (13th -15th centuries and 16th-18th centuries AD).

The exhibition brings together a number of over 500 archeological objects of scientific, historical and aesthetic value, coming from the sites on the territory of Taraclia District, especially from Taraclia-Gaidabul, Taraclia I, Cealîc and others. Work tools, weapons, ornaments and clothing, made of stone, bone, clay, iron, bronze, and other materials, as well as numerous ceramic vessels are on display.

Photographs and drawings from the Museum's collections, personal archives of researchers and scientific publications are used to illustrate the exhibition. For a better perception of the archaeological realities, the exhibition is completed with models of mounds, reconstructions of human activities, etc.

The results of the investigations on the territory of Taraclia District provide a vast, diverse and spectacular informative baggage, important for the knowledge of our past. The purpose of the exhibition is to promote the archaeological heritage discovered in the sites of Taraclia through popularization of the values that are preserved in the museum's collections. The cultural and educational function of the exhibition is to familiarize the general public with materials that reflect the historicity of archaeological sites, their chronological diversity, as well as the uniqueness of artifacts discovered over time in the vicinity of the localities of Taraclia District.