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Historic Serbian Clay Tablets
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A Neolithic figurine from Vinča Culture (ca. 4000 B.C.), discovered on site at Supska near Ćuprija. Modelled according to a pattern and reduced, it has a horizontal frieze on its chest, marked by an upside-down triangle with engraved symbols – an 'inscription'; each symbol was carefully made, precisely in straight line, before the vessel was baked. Each of the total of 9 symbols was also discovered on other objects as individual symbols. (Homeland Museum, Jagodina, IB 5716)
A fragment of a Vinča amphora (ca. 4500 B.C.) from the site at Potporanj near Vršac, with a handle bearing an engraved symbol in the shape of a swastika, made before baking. Actually this symbol, a logogram, is often treated by scientists as a symbol of the Indo-Europeans, and its appearance on objects discovered from the early pre-history of the Balkans is interpreted as the decisive ‘moment’ of the final colonization. However, this symbol is not at all rare in the Vinča system of symbols, and it is older by at least 1500 years! (Folks Museum, Vršac, AP 2039)
‘Ritual Bread’ – an object of ceramics from the Potporanj site near Vršac (ca. 4500 B.C.), whose intended use has not yet been established. In this case, and quite often when weights for vertical looms are in question, the symbols are made by punctation in fresh clay. The surface is clearly divided into zones, and in each of them the points were made in circular fashion – from left to right. It is interesting that the number of points corresponds to prime numbers: 3, 5, 7, 11… In any case, the semiological value of such symbols indicates – numbering, perhaps ritual numbering, in a magical context. (Folks Museum, Vršac, AP 770)
A prosopomorphic lid from Petnica near Valjevo (ca. 4300 B.C.) in the shape of a ritual mask, with two symbols engraved before baking, in the form of the backwards Cyrillic letters T and П. These symbols also appear individually on other types of ceramic objects – most often on pottery but also on figurines. Because of the supposed function of such lids, the symbols could be interpreted as apotropic, as protective symbols. (Petnica Research Station, IB 5923 and onwards)
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EXHIBITION