In Bulgaria, a 2,500-Year-Old Thracian Temple Held a Bronze Ring With Four Hooks, Purpose Unknown

Archaeologists excavating a Thracian temple in southern Bulgaria have found a bronze object that nobody can identify. It is a ring that supports four hooks, and each hook has barbs pointing backward. Assoc. Prof. Kostadin Kisyov, director of the Regional Archaeological Museum in Plovdiv, described the find to the Bulgarian broadcaster bTV. Arkeonews called it a “mechanism,” but its original function remains unknown.

Where it was found

The object came from the pronaos, the entrance chamber, of a temple at a fortified settlement near the village of Vasil Levski. The site lies near the Stryama River, a tributary of the Maritsa, and the southern foothills of the Balkan Mountains. The settlement dates mainly to the 6th and 5th centuries BC. Karlovo Municipality says an earlier Thracian sanctuary stood there in the 9th century BC. Kisyov has investigated the site on and off for about three decades.

What could it be?

Kisyov suggests the ring might originally have supported hanging lamps, although the team found no chains. Fishing gear is another possibility, but the large barbs complicate that idea, and fishing gear of this kind may have served larger rivers or the sea. Neither interpretation is confirmed. Finding the object inside a temple also does not necessarily mean it had a ritual function.

The rest of the site

Karlovo Municipality says the settlement covers more than three hectares. It has two architecturally similar temples, and the team is still investigating the second. Finds include roof tiles with red and black coatings and a golden surface made with a mineral pigment, plus amphorae imported from Chios, Samos and Thasos. Kisyov suggests the two temples honored different deities, but the team has not identified them. Researchers have not conclusively established the settlement as the first Odrysian capital, and its possible link to the ruler Teres I remains tentative.

Source: Reported by Arkeonews on 18 October 2026, citing a bTV interview with Kostadin Kisyov and a Karlovo Municipality release. No peer-reviewed paper is cited. The image on our post is a bTV video screenshot of the object.