Ancient South African Baobab Tree with Bar Inside

There are eight species of Baobab, the African variety, six in Madagascar and one in Australia. The African variety, Adonsonia Digitata, is the largest and is found in 20 sub Saharan countries. It thrives in dry climes which have low to moderate seasonal rainfall.The Sunland Baobab is one of the most famous baobab trees (and there is something awesome hiding inside of it). It’s located in South Africa in the Limpopo Province and is known for being one of the largest and oldest baobabs.

Carbon dating has been used to estimate the Big Baobab’s age at ± 6000 years. To put this in perspective the tree is possibly older than the Giza Pyramids and was certainly here thousands of years before the birth of Jesus Christ. When the first leaves sprouted the Sahara Desert was still lush and green and our Iron Age ancestors were roaming the land.

The Sunland Baobab is naturally hollow on the inside and was not artificially hollowed out.

The bar was created in 1933 and is located on a farm owned by the Van Heerden family. They cleared out the hollow centre of the tree, removing masses of compost build up, to uncover the floor about a meter below ground level. In the process they found evidence of both Bushmen and Voortrekkers, attesting to the historical importance of the tree.

They squared off a natural vent in the trunk to make a door and installed a railway sleeper pub inside the trunk, complete with draft beer, seats and a music system.  One party had 60 people inside the tree bar!. A wine cellar was installed in a second hollow, with a constant temperature of 22° C, ventilated by natural vents.

Sunland’s Baobab is 22 meters high, and is some 47 meters in circumference. It is still (and is likely to remain so) "the record holder for the species", according to the SA Dendrological Society.

Cute little bar, with 13 foot-high ceilings.

The Bushmen believed that the Baobab had offended God and, in revenge, God planted the tree upside down. Certainly, when winter comes, the Baobab resembles a mass of roots pointing towards the sky instead of being underground. The Baobab has been associated with many myths, mysteries and folklore. Even the flowers bloom at night. Bushmen believed that any person who plucks the flowers will be torn apart by lions, because there are spirits in the flowers. When water is drunk, in which the Baobab’s pips have been soaked, this serves as protection from crocodiles and the drinker will be mighty. I wonder if the beer served here has the same effect ?

Only 15 people can fit inside of the tree at once, but the diameter of the tree is nearly 35 feet across.

Being partial to a good pint of beer and trying out new pubs I think I shall have to put this one on my ever increasing 'to do' list   :-)

6,000 Year Old Oak Carving

A 6,000-year-old oak timber carved with a concentric oval pattern and zig-zag lines, recently discovered in the Rhondda Valley, Mid Wales, is thought to be among the oldest decorative wood carvings known from Europe.

Found by Heritage Recording Services Wales during the construction of a wind farm near Maerdy, the 1.7m long timber had been preserved in a waterlogged peat deposit, together with 11 other unmarked pieces of wood.

With one end apparently deliberately rounded and the other tapering slightly, the timber has been interpreted as a post, possibly marking a locally significant site or a tribal boundary, or representing a votive offering. Radiocarbon dating has placed it in c.4270-4000 BC, in the late Mesolithic or early Neolithic period.

‘Most finds from this period consist of stone tools, so to have a decorative carving, on wood no less, is very exciting,’ said lead archaeologist Richard Scott Jones. ‘We all put bets on its age, and people suggested Dark Age, Iron Age – but no one imagined it would come back as Mesolithic. We have since shown it to a number of Neolithic and Mesolithic experts, and they say it is a unique discovery.’

He added: ‘This period marks the transition between mobile hunter-gatherer groups and sedentary settlements. The timber was found by a stream edge on a small flat plateau, and if it is a post, it was probably marking something; maybe a sacred site, or a pool, or a nearby hunting ground – there is an ancient lake bed, which could have attracted animals, just a stone’s throw away – or some kind of boundary.’

Similar abstract patterns are known from Neolithic pottery, and from standing stones such as those at the Gavrinis passage grave in Brittany, or, closer to home, at Barclodiad y Gawres, Anglesey, Richard said.

Due to the rarity of such decorations surviving on ancient timbers, however, the team sent the oak timber to experts from the University of Wales Trinity St David, and Glamorgan-Gwent Archaeological Trust, to confirm that the markings were manmade.

‘We wondered if the lines could have been created by the larvae of oak bark beetles, but after consultation with palaeoentomologists, we are happy that these are not burrowing channels,’ said Richard.

He added: ‘As the timber is about 100 years older than the deposit in which it was found, this may suggest that the oak timber had been brought to the spot deliberately, and perhaps carved on site. If so, then that is a lot of energy to expend, which may indicate that the markings have a special purpose, rather than casual whittling.’

The oak timber is currently undergoing conservation with York Archaeological Trust, where it is expected to remain until 2014.

Source:  http://www.archaeology.co.uk