site.btaArchaeological Excavations of Maltepe Burial Mound Continue

August 28 (BTA) - Prime Minister Boyko Borissov visited
Wednesday the archaeological excavation site of Maltepe, the
largest burial mound on the Balkan Peninsula, located near the
Plovdiv village of Manole (Southern Bulgaria). During the
current archaeological season, a team of the Regional
Archaeological Museum in Plovdiv uncovered an impressive Roman
pyramidal tower.

The tower is about 20 metres high and is made of stone and brick
 with mortar. Hundreds of tonnes of earth were used by the
ancient builders to reach this record height.

Plovdiv Regional MuseumТs Assoc. Prof. Konstantin Kisyov
explained that they built one metre, then buried what they had
left, raising the whole mound, then again they built two more
metres, buried them, and basically used the mound as
scaffolding.

The earth-covered mound was topped by a marble pedestal with a
statue. There are already different theories as to who was
buried at Maltepe, including that it may have been a Thracian
Odryssian aristocrat.

Bulgarian researchers expect Maltepe to become a worldwide
archaeological sensation. RY/DT

/DT/