Tuesday, March 19, 2024
Contact    |    RSS icon Twitter icon Facebook icon  
Unexplained Mysteries
You are viewing: Home > News > Archaeology & History > News story
Welcome Guest ( Login or Register )  
All ▾
Search Submit

Archaeology & History

3,500-year-old lunch box found in Swiss Alps

By T.K. Randall
July 26, 2017 · Comment icon 12 comments

The lunch box was found high up in the Alps. Image Credit: CC BY-SA 2.0 Edgar Jimenez
An extraordinarily well-preserved lunch box has been discovered on Switzerland's Lotschberg mountain.
The immaculate wooden container, which was lost by its owner sometime around 1500 B.C., is so well preserved that it even contains traces of the grains that were once kept inside it.

It was discovered at the top of the Lotschenpass at an altitude of 2,650 meters above sea level.

"The box has this kind of strange amorphous residue on it," said study author Jessica Hendy of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
"Cereal grains quite rarely survive thousands of years. Sometimes they survive when they're charred, but then they lose some of their diagnostic traits."

In addition to being incredibly rare, the find has also proven useful to scientists studying the development of cereal farming in Bronze Age Europe.

"We knew that cereals were around but don't know how important they were in the general economy," said Hendy. "Now we've developed [a technique to trace these grains], we can try to apply it more widely to understand how important cereals were for these early farmers."

Source: IB Times | Comments (12)




Other news and articles
Recent comments on this story
Comment icon #3 Posted by Taun 7 years ago
Cereal farming - specifically wheat - has been going on since about 10,000 BC... The grains in the lunch box are closer to our time than to the development of cereal farming... The Egyptians were using yeast to make "rising bread" (like today's loaves) since about 3,000 BC... But it's still a cool find... http://www.allaboutwheat.info/history.html
Comment icon #4 Posted by Claire. 7 years ago
I was referring specifically to Bronze Age Europe, but I appreciate the article as it provides a great deal of interesting information, organized in an easy to understand timeline. So thank you for that.
Comment icon #5 Posted by Bean85 7 years ago
Taun: And the MC cheeseburger still in its wrapping
Comment icon #6 Posted by RoofGardener 7 years ago
Best place for it !
Comment icon #7 Posted by Attila911us 7 years ago
Was it the kind of cereal that we eat today? Like Fruit Loops or Lucky Charms?
Comment icon #8 Posted by Gingitsune 7 years ago
The article mention "spelt, emmer and barley", not so mainstream anymore. Tastes change. 
Comment icon #9 Posted by Krater 7 years ago
I was kind of hoping for a "Dukes of Hazzard" box with matching thermos.
Comment icon #10 Posted by third_eye 7 years ago
Bet the fries were soggy back then too ... ~
Comment icon #11 Posted by Dyna 7 years ago
What an odd looking
Comment icon #12 Posted by Dyna 7 years ago
 


Please Login or Register to post a comment.


Our new book is out now!
Book cover

The Unexplained Mysteries
Book of Weird News

 AVAILABLE NOW 

Take a walk on the weird side with this compilation of some of the weirdest stories ever to grace the pages of a newspaper.

Click here to learn more

We need your help!
Patreon logo

Support us on Patreon

 BONUS CONTENT 

For less than the cost of a cup of coffee, you can gain access to a wide range of exclusive perks including our popular 'Lost Ghost Stories' series.

Click here to learn more

Recent news and articles