A man renovating his wine cellar was left shocked after discovering the remains of prehistoric mammoths.
Andreas Pernerstorfer, a winemaker from the village of Gobelsburg in the district of Krems, west of Vienna, found several large bones buried deep in his cellar.
He reported the find to authorities, who identified the remains as belonging to at least three Stone Age mammoths.
Mr Pernerstorfer told the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF) that he was renovating his wine cellar when he made the discovery.
“I thought it was just a piece of wood left by my grandfather. But then I dug it out a bit and then I remembered that in the past my grandfather said he had found teeth. And then I immediately thought it was a mammoth," he said.
Researchers from the Austrian Archaeological Institute (OeAW) have been excavating the bones since mid-May.
Archaeologists Thomas Einwögerer and Hannah Parow-Souchon confirmed that stone artefacts and charcoal found at the site indicate the bones are between 30,000 and 40,000 years old.
The discovery has been hailed as an “archaeological sensation” by the OeAW.
The Institute said the last comparable discovery in the district of Krems was 150 years ago.
“During the excavation there, the cellars in question were completely cleared out. Other comparable sites in Austria and neighbouring countries were mostly excavated at least 100 years ago and have largely beenlost to modern research,” it said in a statement.
Ms Parow-Souchon said it was the first time they’d been able to investigate such a find in Austria “using modern methods”.
Researchers say the discovery raises questions about how Stone Age people hunted mammoths.
“We know that humans hunted mammoths, but we still know very little about how they did it,” Ms Parow-Souchon said.
They believe the mammoths could have died on the spot where the bones were found, chased there by humans who may have set a trap for them.
Once they are excavated, the bones will be taken to the Vienna Museum of Natural History.
