3,000 Year Old Amulet of Egyptian Goddess Unearthed in Spain

Excavations in the Spanish town of Salamanca have unearthed a 3,000-year-old amulet of the Ancient Egyptian goddess Hathor, the deity of women, of the sky, of fertility and of love. Enchanting, but how did that get there?

Don’t fret, it doesn’t seem to be another case of colonial theft, but rather appears to have been crafted in Egypt before arriving in the Iron Age town of Cerro de San Vicente de            Salamanca some short time later, and its presence is believed to reflect commercial trade routes and connections of the time.

Led by Antonio Blanco, Carlos Macarro and Cristina Alario, a team of archaeologists from the University of Salamanca and the local City Council had been excavating the site since the 1990s and announced the discovery on Sunday.

Macarro noted the fact that it was placed in someone’s backyard as opposed to accompanying them in their burial site for eternal protection indicates that it belonged to an especially esteemed and wealthy member of the local society. Which isn’t too surprising, really, I mean we wouldn’t expect an everyday Iron Age peasant to procure a ceramic quartz amulet from across the Mediterranean. Although we do wonder - was it a gift, or a souvenir, or something else entirely? That’s a question for the archaeologists to figure out.