A Bronze Age Bag from the Swiss Alps

It was another hot summer in Switzerland, so more artifacts melted out of glaciers in the high Alps. Archaeologists working near the top of Lötschenpass, an ancient route between the Bernese Oberland to the north and the Valais region to the south, found more wooden and leather objects to add to a bunch recovered in 2011. These included a bow, a wooden box, and the small bag above. All date to the Bronze Age, 2000 to 1800 BCE. The bag is made of two pieces of birch bark, sewn around the edges. No guesses as to what it was used for.

But it's another reminder that highly mobile people need ways to carry things. Like Ötzi the Iceman, who was weighed down with bags and boxes.