The Berlin gold hat was made round 3,000 years in the past from a single sheet of gold and accentuated with motifs that characterize a calendar.
(Picture credit score: Alamy)
QUICK FACTS
Title: Berlin gold hat
What it’s: A tall, conical hat
The place it’s from: Doubtlesssouthern Germany
When it was made: Circa 1000 to 800 B.C.
This tall, conical hat constructed from a single sheet of hammered gold was seemingly worn by an historical priest throughout a solar cult ceremony. The Berlin gold hat is the very best preserved instance of solely 4 Bronze Age equipment of this sort which have been present in Central and Western Europe.
The gold hat is within the assortment of the Museum of Prehistory and Early History in Berlin. The museum acquired the artifact in 1996 after it circulated on the antiquities market. In consequence, it’s unclear the place the hat was discovered, however the different three recognized Bronze Age gold hats have been found in southern Germany and western France.
The hat is roughly 29 inches (74 centimeters) tall and weighs simply over 1 pound (480 grams). It’s accented with a flat bronze band with a bronze wire bordering its brim. A wool or felt lining was seemingly worn beneath the gold hat to stabilize it, however no traces of a lining stay.
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Bands of ornament on the Berlin gold hat make the artifact stand out. The repeated motifs of concentric circles, disks, ovals and different symbols encode numerical values that correspond to a calendar, archaeologist Wilfried Menghin argued in a 2008 study. Every band represents a numerical worth, and mixtures of bands may help calculate lunar months and photo voltaic years, in addition to convert between lunar and photo voltaic dates. The calendar may also be used to foretell lunar eclipses.
“The one who wore this hat was the service of secret and really particular information,” Matthias Wemhoff, director of the Museum of Prehistory and Early Historical past, mentioned in a translated 2018 video. Wemhoff described the hat’s wearer as a priest who could have come out on a mountaintop at dawn. The glistening gold hat would have caught the solar’s first morning rays, dazzling the opposite members within the ceremony.
Though there aren’t any historic information of a Bronze Age solar cult in Europe, different astonishing artifacts, such because the Trundholm Sun Chariot and the Nebra Sky Disk, showcase the significance of celestial our bodies to those prehistoric societies.
For extra gorgeous archaeological discoveries, take a look at our Astonishing Artifacts archives.
