31/10/2025
In 1961, in a small village in Transylvania, Romania, archaeologists unearthed three clay tablets etched with strange symbols — markings unlike anything seen before in Europe. 📜
Known as the Tărtăria Tablets, they date to around 5300 BC, making them older than Sumerian cuneiform by nearly 2,000 years. Each bears incised symbols that resemble writing — crosses, animals, and abstract signs — but their meaning remains a mystery.
Were these tablets the work of the Vinča culture, an early Neolithic society that flourished across the Balkans? If so, they could represent the earliest form of writing in human history — or perhaps a ritual language, never meant to record speech at all.
Scholars still debate their purpose. Some call them proof of Europe’s forgotten civilization; others, a symbolic code or religious artifact.
Whatever their function, the Tărtăria Tablets challenge one of humanity’s oldest assumptions — that writing began in Mesopotamia.
📍 Tărtăria – Alba County, Romania
