Miners working in a brown coal mine, in the north-eastern city of Bukkabrany, were the first, to uncover several tree trunks that had been turned into coal, this drew the attention of archeologists and they dug further.
Thanks to an ancient sand storm, they were able to uncover 16 preserved trunks, of cypress trees, estimated to be eight million years old. The stumps, 2-3m (10ft) in diameter and 6m (19ft) high, stand uncovered on the lowest level of the mine.
The trees grew in the swampland that surrounded the freshwater lake that occupied the ransdanubia region millions of years ago.
Tamas Pusztai, the deputy director and head of the archaeological department at the local Otto Herman museum who oversaw the excavation is quoted to have said:
The discovery is exceptional as the trees kept their wooden structure, they neither turned into coal nor were petrified,
They are in fact a mysterious forest of taxodiums, a kind of swamp cypress. A sandstorm, which covered the forest with sand up to a height of six meters helped preserve the trees. All that was above perished but the part that was buried under the sand remained intact. The grey sand was free from bacteria and so prevented the trunks from eroding. The wood not covered by the sand rotted away, leaving only the trunks.
To reach the trunks you have to descend about 60 metres into a 3 500-square-metre large open mine. Even then, you would not be allowed near the trees. Although the trunks cannot be moved as, they collapse when exposed to air and sunlight, which are especially harmful given the wood’s age.
Geologists led by Dr. Miklos Kazmer (ELTE Paleontology Department) and Dr. Lilla Hably (Plant Collection of the Hungarian Natural History Museum) will perform tests on them to determine their exact age and the climate in which they lived.
A similar forest was already found in Japan, where archaeologists preserved it in a cement sarcophagus.The site is to close again soon and the archaeologists have started taking measures to preserve the trees.
Source: BBC
