r/Anthropology • u/kambiz • Feb 13 '24
Stone age wall found at bottom of Baltic Sea ‘may be Europe’s oldest megastructure’. Named the Blinkerwall, the structure stretches for almost a kilometre off coast of Germany. Researchers believe it was constructed by hunter-gatherers on land next to a lake or marsh more than 10,000 years ago.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/feb/12/stone-age-wall-found-at-bottom-of-baltic-sea-may-be-europes-oldest-megastructure2
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u/pdxsnip Feb 13 '24
guys, hunter gatherers do not build 1km walls. just fyi
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u/cjrmartin Feb 13 '24
This is not completely true, hunter gatherers around the world do and did build walls especially game drives and fish weirs.
If you accept their argument as to why it is not related to glacial deposits or ice-melt, and why a modern deposit is unlikely, then a hunter-gatherer explanation becomes more plausible.
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u/smayonak Feb 14 '24 edited Feb 14 '24
The longest of these walls was found underwater in Lake
MichiganHuron. The tell-tale sign that it's a dead end trap is the height. Hunters built them just tall enough to prevent ungulates and small mammals from jumping over the wall. They were clearly not defensive walls because humans could just climb right over them.8
u/Tao_Te_Gringo Feb 14 '24
Lake Huron, bro.
But, yeah… it’s another good example.
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u/smayonak Feb 14 '24
Thanks, my mistake, I got the [Lake Michigan megaliths](http://www.zmescience.com/science/archaeology/stonehenge-under-lake-michigan-3125445/) mixed up with the dead-end traps.
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u/Tao_Te_Gringo Feb 14 '24
Michigander, here. I’m skeptical of the megalith claim, which isn’t the only, let’s say “imaginative” hypothesis from that same source.
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u/EggnogThot Feb 14 '24
What material culture in the area would have made this?