Ukraine's Ancient Shumer Civilization

Interesting: the civilization used fire not for destruction but for creation
Over 50 scientists from Ukraine, Russia, Great Britain, Rumania, Israel and Moldova have taken part in the scientific conference dedicated to the 110th anniversary of discovery of the Tripolskaya civilization. This is one of the most mysterious civilizations in the history of the world.

There is a hypothesis claiming that the people belonging to the Tripolskaya civilization were the ancestors of the ancient Shumer civilization. The name of the Tripolskaya civilization comes from the name of the place in the Kiev Region of Ukraine, the settlement of Tripolye where one of the first ancient settlements was found at the end of the 19th century.

Cities of the Tripolskaya culture with the population of several thousand people in the 4th - first half of the 3rd millennia B.C. were situated on the territory along the Dnieper River and also on the territory of today's Moldavia and Rumania. Remains of the largest settlements of the Tripolskaya civilization were discovered on the territory of the Cherkassy Region.

In 2002, the government of Ukraine ordered to open Europe's first state historical and cultural reserve called "Tripolskaya Culture" on the territory of the Cherkassy Region. The reserve consists of 12 villages situated in the Talnoye, Usman and Zvenigorod districts. Scientists hope that opening of the reserve may help prevent demolition of archeological monuments that are often destroyed when agricultural works are held.

Meanwhile, if the archeological monuments disappear there will be no hope to solve numerous secrets of the Tripolskaya civilization. For example, nobody knows why people of the civilization built their cities, stayed there for several decades but then burnt them down and left for a new place. One of the explanations to the phenomenon is an ecological one: it is said that people left their old haunts as soon as they found out that natural resources of the place were exhausted.

However, there is another hypothesis saying that traces of burning were not the evidence of destruction; on the contrary they were the evidence of creation. Some researchers say that people of the civilization used fire for construction of their many-storied habitations.

To verify both hypotheses, a unique historical and archeological experiment was held in Ukraine's Cherkassy Region. Near the settlement of Talyanki, where traces of one of the largest cities of the Tripolskaya civilization were discovered, archeologists built and then burnt down a construction resembling habitations that the Tripolskaya civilization had built. For construction of the building scientists from the expedition of the Institute of Archeology of the NANU used information about real buildings built by the Tripolskaya civilization; the information was obtained through numerous archeological excavations. This is very interesting that Cherkassy archeologists say the construction and burning of the building according to the ancient model was financed by one of the programs of Russia's First Channel television; it cost about $1,000. It is believed that the experiment will help scientists advance with solution of the mysteries of the Tripolskaya civilization. For the time being, archeologists and local scientists say the main objective is preservation of the unique archeological monuments.