Wednesday, 21st February 2007 (4858 views)

The extraordinary discovery of a 5,000-year old golden eyeball has been made on the Iran-Afghan border by a team of Italian archaeologists searching for an ancient necropolis.

This is the earliest artificial eye ever found and is believed to have been worn by an ancient soothsayer who wanted to look mystical and ethereal to maintain her position.

Mansour Sajjadi found the eyeball, which has a diameter of about an inch and is made of bitumen paste covered in gold and decorated with a sun-like pattern.

It is believed to have been worn with the purpose of transfixing those who saw it and convincing people of the wearer's occult powers and ability to look into the future.

Dated from between 2900 and 2800 BC, it is older than Stonehenge and a vital artefact from ancient Persia.

Lorenzo Costantini, an archaeologist working on the project, said: "She must have been a very striking and exotic figure.

"It must have glittered spectacularly, conferring on the woman a mysterious and supernatural gaze."

At first the team believed she had just had the eye upon burial but now they think she wore it during her lifetime because she sufferered an abscess on her eyelid as a result.

 

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