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#Exhibit of the Month

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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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Events Archive

The European Night of Museums 2012

19 May 2012

National Museum of Archaeology and History of Moldova for the seventh time has participated in the Night of Museums, a successful event initiated by the Ministry of Culture and Communication of France and carried out in Europe already for the eighth time. The museum was opened to the public from 18:00 to 02:00, access was free. The event was attended by 8516 people.  

  
The night event included:

1. Visiting of exhibitions. The cultural rendezvous was accompanied by alternative activities:

  • Screening of mini-films presenting the museum collections
  • Recital of the string quartet of the Academy of Music, Theatre, and Fine Arts (artistic director A. Molodojan)
  • Piano music performed by the students of the Academy of Music, Theatre, and Fine Arts
  • Parade of historical characters
  • Torchlight procession. Fighting of warriors in armor (Club of Historical Fencing an Reconstruction „Ensifer", director Mikhail Tereshchenko)



2. Interactive presentations of enigmatic objects in the permanent exhibition. Under the title "Unsolved Mysteries" there were presented a number of strange, unexplained objects from the museum collection (a "scepter" of the Late Bronze Age (end of the 2nd millennium B.C.) found in the hoard at Lozova; binocular vessels of the middle period of Cucuteni-Tripolye Culture (end of the 5th - beginning of the 3rd millennia B.C.); miniature clay figurines of the 8th - 10th centuries found at Durlești), which practical use, generic functions or exact origin have not been clarified until now; there are only certain assumptions and hypotheses. Visitors were invited to explain the origin or functionality of these artifacts. In this interactive activity 144 people were involved. The most interesting of the assumptions will be awarded by the museum and will be a subject to an article.

3. Mini-exhibitions under the title „An Exhibit Story". There were presented to the public the album „History of the Bender-Galati Railway Section", an icon of the Virgin and Child, and the saber of Russian Tsarevich Alexei. They continue the theme of exhibits with stories that was initiated in 2011.


4. The stand of a medieval knight. At the stand visitors could try on armor (chain mail and helmet) and walk in them through the museum.

5. The Ikebana Workshop of Angela Lobastova, president of the "Ikenobo" Japanese Culture and Art Center  in Chișinău. Everyone could try to arrange flowers under the guidance of master Lobastova.

6.  CHRONOGRAPH at the Museum. Screenings of historical and cultural films of the 10th International Documentary Film Festival CHRONOGRAPH 2012 that had place in Chisinau from 10 to 15 May 2012. There were presented the following films:

18:30: SĂRMAna de pe Prut / The Wired Prut (Republic of Moldova) - 47 min.
19:30: The Train Station Latvians 1937 (Latvia) - 64 min.
20:45: A. Leonov. The Spacewalker (France, Russia) - 60 min.
22:00: Love Stories from Moscow 1993-2009 (Germany) - 115 min.

7. Photographer's parlor "Retro-Museum". In one of the rooms of the museum there was made a reconstruction of a photographer's parlor from Chisinau of the past, where visitors were able to rediscover a solemnity of the lost ritual: visiting a photographer to make a picture by all canons of beauty of the past time.


8. Exhibition of ceramics and master class with Ivan Prividiuc in the museum courtyard.

9. Tour „Panorama of Chișinău at Night", which was one of the main points of the program of the Night of Museums in 2012. In cooperation with the City Hall of Chisinau and the Chisinau City Bus Fleet there was organized a pilot route "National Museum of Archaeology and History of Moldova - Museum of History of Chișinău (Mateevici Street)". Every half hour a bus traveled between the two museums, allowing the visitors to admire the panorama of Chișinău at night from the terrace on the tower, which houses the museum of city history.

10. Raffle Night of Museums 2012 with the special prize for visitors - a bicycle „Giant SNAP 21" provided by „DAAC-VELO-SPORT" S.R.L. The bicycle was won by Mikhail Lavrovsky.


Parteners:



 

 


Independent Moldova
Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic
Bessarabia and MASSR between the Two World Wars
Bessarabia and Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in the Period between the Two World Wars
Revival of National Movement
Time of Reforms and their Consequences
Abolition of Autonomy. Bessarabia – a New Tsarist Colony
Period of Relative Autonomy of Bessarabia within the Russian Empire
Phanariot Regime
Golden Age of the Romanian Culture
Struggle for Maintaining of Independence of Moldova
Formation of Independent Medieval State of Moldova
Era of the
Great Nomad Migrations
Early Middle Ages
Iron Age and Antiquity
Bronze Age
Aeneolithic Age
Neolithic Age
Palaeolithic Age
  
  

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#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...

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The National Museum of History of Moldova takes place among the most significant museum institutions of the Republic of Moldova, in terms of both its collection and scientific reputation.
©2006-2026 National Museum of History of Moldova
Visit museum 31 August 1989 St., 121 A, MD 2012, Chisinau, Republic of Moldova
Phones:
Secretariat: +373 (22) 24-43-25
Department of Public Relations and Museum Education: +373 (22) 24-04-26
Fax: +373 (22) 24-43-69
E-mail: office@nationalmuseum.md
Technical Support: info@nationalmuseum.md
Web site administration and maintenance: Andrei EMILCIUC

 



The National Museum of History of Moldova takes place among the most significant museum institutions of the Republic of Moldova, in terms of both its collection and scientific reputation.
©2006-2026 National Museum of History of Moldova
Visit museum 31 August 1989 St., 121 A, MD 2012, Chisinau, Republic of Moldova
Phones:
Secretariat: +373 (22) 24-43-25
Department of Public Relations and Museum Education: +373 (22) 24-04-26
Fax: +373 (22) 24-43-69
E-mail: office@nationalmuseum.md
Technical Support: info@nationalmuseum.md
Web site administration and maintenance: Andrei EMILCIUC

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The National Museum of History of Moldova takes place among the most significant museum institutions of the Republic of Moldova, in terms of both its collection and scientific reputation.
©2006-2026 National Museum of History of Moldova
Visit museum 31 August 1989 St., 121 A, MD 2012, Chisinau, Republic of Moldova
Phones:
Secretariat: +373 (22) 24-43-25
Department of Public Relations and Museum Education: +373 (22) 24-04-26
Fax: +373 (22) 24-43-69
E-mail: office@nationalmuseum.md
Technical Support: info@nationalmuseum.md
Web site administration and maintenance: Andrei EMILCIUC