Mammoth Tooth Found in the Oberaargau During the Ice Age
Published: Monday, Oct 16th 2023, 10:40
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Employees of the Kieswerk Wynau quarry in the Bernese Oberaargau have discovered the tusk of a mammoth with a digger. The tusk, which is around half a metre long, is believed to have belonged to a mammoth that lived during the Ice Age more than 25,000 years ago. The employees had noticed strange objects during the summer quarrying and contacted the Archaeological Service of the Canton of Bern. The Service confirmed that the objects were fragments of a mammoth tusk. Glaciologists from the University of Bern examined the site and concluded that a river had once flowed through the current quarry. Radiocarbon dating narrowed the age of the tusk to between 24,800 and 24,100 BC. This was the time when mammoths became extinct in the region. The Archaeological Service and the Natural History Museum of the Burgergemeinde Bern will decide how to conserve the tusk and where to store it. Ice Age finds are rare, but a mammoth tusk was discovered in the same quarry in 1979, about 400 metres from the current find.
©Keystone/SDA
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