Archaeologists are perplexed by a weird discovery on an ancient mountain trail

In November 2024, something very unusual was discovered on a mountain trail in Switzerland that had long served as a path through the mountains region. The peculiar find puzzled archeologists and we're still waiting to learn more. Let's dive into the discovery.

Swiss hiker Sergio Veri stumbled across something very fascinating while wandering in Splügen Pass in the Swiss Alps and it may prove to be a find of immense archeological significance: it was a bamboo cart. 

While a bamboo cart might not seem like something very special, it was an unusual item for Veri to have come across in the Swiss Alps since bamboo is native to Europe and was only introduced to the continent sometime in the late 1700s or early 1800s. 

According to Heritage Daily, Veri reported his discovery to the Canton of Graubünden in Switzerland, which promptly published a few shots of the wrecked wagon on Facebook and explained why such a find could be historically significant. 

Photo Credit: Facebook @KantonGR

The Canton of Graubünden jokingly referred to the bamboo cart as a “UFO” and asked the public for help identifying its creator and function. Popular Mechanics reported that the material used to build the cart likely meant it was brought into the region from elsewhere. 

The cart itself was described as having wheels that were made out of bamboo rods tides with laces and the Canton of Graubünden said that it was planning to investigate the archeological artifact to figure out more information about it. 

Photo Credit: Facebook @KantonGR

Popular Mechanics reported that online theories speculated that the bamboo cart could have been used for everything from hauling supplies while hunting to an important item in a smuggling operation and even possible plane parts. 

Photo Credit: Facebook @KantonGR

The discovery of a bamboo cart made somewhere outside of Europe and brought to the region only to spend centuries buried under glacial ice on the Splügen Pass isn’t quite as abnormal as you might think. The Splügen Pass has been a well-trodden trail since ancient times. 

Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By I, Paebi, CC BY-SA 3.0

The Splügen Pass connects the Swiss Hinterrhein Valley and Splügen region of the Canton of Graubünden with the Valle San Giacomo with the Valle San Giacomo and Chiavenna regions of Italy’s Sondrio province, and it has been used since at least the time of the Romans. 

“Documentary evidence suggests that the Splügen Pass has been used since antiquity, where it was possibly known as the Cunus Aureus, as shown on the Tabula Peutingeriana, a map prepared by Agrippa during the reign of the emperor Augustus (27 BC to AD 14),” Heritage Daily explained. 

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Photo Credit: Wiki Commons By Unknown Author, Bibliotheca Augustana, Public Domain