Devetashka

a natural cave with the remains of ancient settlements, located 15 km northeast of the city of Lovech in northern Bulgaria. The settlements were discovered by the Bulgarian scholar G. Katsarov in 1921 and were excavated by the archaeologists V. Mikov in 1927 and 1950 and N. Dzhambazov in 1952. The cultural level, which measures from 0.3 to 5.5 m, contains the remains of different epochs: the Paleolithic (flint Mousterian-type tools; Upper Paleolithic flint and bone artifacts), the Neolithic (hearths with stone foundations; flat stone axes; flint knives and scrapers, bone polishers, awls, and chisels; pottery with painting or carving), the Aeneolithic (the remains of rectangular dwellings; ovens; grain mortars; stone and bone tools; vessels with carved, embossed, or other ornamentation; anthropomorphic figures; one brass awl), the Bronze Age (bronze battle-axes; dark-polished undecorated ceramics), and the Early Iron Age (bronze fibulae and knives; iron tools and weapons; pottery modeled by hand or on on the wheel; the remains of a house on piles). Devetashka’s most recent remain is a Roman sanctuary.