#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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#Exhibit of the Month

September 2022

Needle case

This is a case for needles, unusually large in size. It was used in the Stone Age as a container for storing and preserving small and fragile items. The case was discovered by the famous researcher Ilie Borziac in 1996 during archaeological excavations at a multi-layered Upper Paleolithic site in the village of Cosauți, Soroca district. The artifact was found at a depth of 9.7-9.85 m in a loess-like occupation layer, among the remains of a seasonal deer hunter camp (in the so-called occupation layer 5). The occupation layer was dated by radiocarbon method to 18140 ± 180. The object is 17.6 cm long and 1.5 cm in diameter. It was made of a thin-walled tubular bone, probably of a large bird (eagle, bustard or gull). The ends of the object were cut across. A round hole 5 mm in diameter with carefully polished edges was made at one of the ends.

The entire surface of the product is polished to a shine. It is ornamented with notches. The notches are applied rhythmically around the entire perimeter. They, without a doubt, indicate that the work was made by human hands. The length of the notches is 3-3.5 mm. They are located transversely, grouped in three rows. The number of notches in the rows is 8/8, 16/10, 14/7, with an average distance between notches of 4 mm.

The researchers who addressed the issue of the functionality of this rare archaeological piece, put forward several hypotheses. One of them is that the artifact probably had a multifunctional practical utility. According to one hypothesis, the presence of a hole at one end of the object indicates that it is a flute. This opinion was called into question due to the identification of only one obvious hole on the surface of the artifact. Most likely, the presence of the hole indicates that a thread was passed through it to hang the case with needles in order to protect and secure it. On the other hand, the relatively large size of this object also allows it to be used as a coupling. According to another version, this kind of vestiges could be used by hunters to remove skins from hunted animals, as a tube for pumping air under the skin of small animals in the process of skinning them. This not only greatly facilitated the removal of the skin, but also kept the subcutaneous fat intact.

Specimens of equally large sizes, similar to the one found at the ford on the Dniester, made of tubular bone with cut off epiphyses, were discovered at several Neolithic sites in Yakutia. Here they were used as needle cases. Some of them were found with needles inside, which confirmed their practical functionality.

#Exhibit of the Month

Ceramic Vessel Set from Bălceana-Hâncești (5th–7th Centuries)

September 2022

Needle case

#Exhibit of the Month