To the Stone Age agriculturalists on Bornholm, a Danish island off the coast of Sweden, the best way to deal with bad weather was to sacrifice stones. That’s according to recent research in Antiquity, which reimagines the island’s sun stone artifacts as summons for the sun.
The stones appeared at the Neolithic, or New Stone Age, site of Vasagård approximately 4,900 years ago, at around the same time as a devastating volcanic winter in Northern Europe. The objects may have been sacrificial donations or offerings, deposited in ditches in an attempt to bring back warm weather and sunshine.
“One type of find that is completely unique to Bornholm is the so-called sun stones, which are flat shale pieces with engraved patterns and sun motifs,” said Rune Iversen, one of the authors of the recent research and an archaeologist at the University of Copenhagen, in a press release. “They symbolized fertility and were probably sacrificed to ensure sun and growth.”
