This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Underwater archaeological investigations have been taking place in Lake Arendsee (Altmarkkreis Salzwedel) for several years. The discovery of Neolithic fish weirs, a high medieval barge (flat-bottomed cargo ship) and a late medieval dugout canoe attracted considerable attention.
In the summer of 2026, researchers from the State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology (LDA) Saxony-Anhalt succeeded in unlocking another secret of the lake. The new finds date back around 10,500 years, when people were not yet permanently settled and lived by hunting, gathering and fishing. During this period, which archaeologists refer to as the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age), the shaman of Bad Dürrenberg also lived—and there is evidence that people were already present on the shores of Lake Arendsee.
Due to a geological peculiarity of the lake, traces of settlements from that time, as well as the former shoreline, are exceptionally well preserved. Unlike other inland bodies of water, which slowly silt up over millennia, the bottom of Lake Arendsee is slowly sinking due to geological processes involving an underlying salt dome. As a result, the Mesolithic finds now lie beneath a thin layer of sediment at a depth of approximately 20 meters (66 feet) and are exceptionally well preserved.
"Besides the usual finds from this period, such as stone tools or animal bones, our divers were able to recover spectacular pieces of wood, which have very rarely survived from this era," explains state archaeologist Harald Meller. "The finds shed a completely new light on the Mesolithic period, for which traces of buildings in central Germany have so far only been known in the form of soil discolorations." According to initial findings, a post 1.60 meters (5.2 feet) high with felling marks and split boards up to 1.30 meters (4.3 feet) long could be remnants of architectural structures. "Whether we are looking at the remains of huts or other, previously completely unknown wooden structures is the subject of ongoing and future research.
If permanent buildings or intensively cultivated living spaces already existed 10,500 years ago—that is, 3,000 years before the arrival of the first farmers with their longhouses in Central Europe—this would have far-reaching consequences not only for our understanding of hunter-gatherers, but also for the origins of modern cultural landscapes," explains Marcel Weiß, project head for the LDA Saxony-Anhalt. "Underwater archaeology at Lake Arendsee offers a unique opportunity to learn about the roots of our modern world." To date, the fundamental transformation of the natural environment into cultural landscapes has been associated with the first farmers who migrated to central Germany around 5500 B.C. Following the site's discovery in spring 2026, researchers recovered further samples and individual finds to determine its extent and age.
In a second campaign, in collaboration with the Fraunhofer IOSB-AST in Ilmenau, high-resolution sonar scans were conducted using a remotely operated vehicle (ROV)—an underwater robot—to document the contours of the former shoreline. The precise location of each find allows researchers to delineate potential archaeological sites and plan future underwater archaeological investigations. "The support of underwater work with state-of-the-art technologies developed at the Fraunhofer Institute in Ilmenau is invaluable for archaeology," says Sven Thomas, diving operations manager for the LDA Saxony-Anhalt at Lake Arendsee.
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