Stone blocks may be part of Europe’s first step pyramid

Researchers said on Wednesday they have found geometrically cut stone blocks covering a central Bosnian hill that a hobby archaeologist claims is a pyramid.

Archaeologists and other experts began digging on the sides of the mysterious hill near the central Bosnian town of Visoko. The hill revealed geometrical stone blocks on one side that Semir Osmanagic, the leader of the team, claims are the outer layer of the pyramid.

“These are the first uncovered walls of the pyramid,” said Osmanagic, who studied Latin-American pyramids for 15 years and who proposed the theory that the 650m mound rising above the small town of Visoko is actually a step pyramid -- the first such found in Europe.

“We can see the surface is perfectly flat. This is the crucial material proof that we are talking pyramids,” he said. The huge stone blocks appear to be cut in cubes and polished.

“It is so obvious that the top of the blocks, the surface is man-made,” Osmanagic said. He plans to continue the works throughout the summer, “after which the pyramid will be visible”, he said.

The research on the hill, known as Visocica, found that it has perfectly shaped, 45-degree slopes pointing toward the cardinal points, and a flat top. Under layers of dirt, workers discovered a paved entrance plateau, entrances to tunnels and large stone blocks that might be part of a pyramid’s outer surface.

Satellite photographs and thermal imaging revealed two other, smaller pyramid-shaped hills in the Visoko valley. Last week’s excavations began with a team of rescue workers from a nearby coal mine being sent into a tunnel believed to be part of an underground network connecting three pyramidal-shaped hills.

They were followed by archaeologists, geologists and other experts who emerged from the tunnel later to declare that it was certainly man-made.

The work will continue for about six months at the site just outside Visoko, about 30km north-west of the capital, Sarajevo. Two experts from Egypt are due to join the team in mid-May.

“It will be a very exciting archaeological spring and summer,” Osmanagic said. Computer rendering of the Bosnian Sun Pyramid