A unique bronze hexagonal mold used for making decorative and jewelry items, Dacia (modern-day Romania), circa 100 BC.

It was used to make several dozen stamps and casting molds. This priceless artifact was discovered under the roots of a tree blown down by a strong wind at the Sarmizegetusa Regia archaeological site in Romania.

This mold likely originated in a local Dacian jewelry workshop. It features a number of real and mythological animals, including lions, tigers, panthers, rhinoceroses, hippopotamuses, bears, boars, wolves, aurochs, antelopes, and... one rabbit.

The mold also features three types of griffin: the vulture-vulture, the lion-griffin, and the wolf-griffin, a type of griffin typical of the northern Black Sea region.

The matrix weighs approximately 8 kg and has eight faces, two of which are hexagonal. Its thickness is approximately 5 cm.

It was created and used in the first century BCE. This discovery in the capital of the Dacian Kingdom is evidence of this region's connection to the artistic and high-tech cultural space of antiquity.

Museum of Dacian and Roman Civilization, Deva County, Romania
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