Archaeologists discover 7,000-year-old underwater city in major breakthrough

Archaeologists made a significant breakthrough when they discovered the remains of a 7,000-year-old road of an ancient city underwater off the coast of present-day Croatia.
The ancient city, known as Soline, was built by the ancient Neolithic culture, Hvar-Lisičići, on an artificial landmass beneath the Adriatic Sea, which once connected the ancient city to the mainland. It comes shortly after a separate major breakthrough in Egypt as explorers continue to unravel some of the world’s greatest mysteries.
But it began to sink off the coast of present-day Croatia at around 12,000 BC when sea levels rose following the last Ice Age. 
A team of international researchers began visiting the area in March 2023, where they utilized underwater 3D seismic sensors to map out the ancient city. 
“It’s a more diverse landscape and it’s better preserved than we expected,’ geo-archaeologist Dr. Simon Fitch, who leads the investigation, said in a statement.
“The results provided way more detail than we were expecting,” Dr. Fitch added. 
Archaeoloigsts made their discovery on May 6, 2023, when they found “strange structures” that looks like a roadway submerged about 16 feet beneath the Adraitic Sea. 
The road consists of “carefully stacked stone plates” that measures about 13 feet wide, and is buried under sea mud deposits.
The stone roadway is believed to have been built by the Hvar culture, and connected the prehistoric settlement of the Hvar with the coast of the island of Korčula. 
“There are beautifully preserved rivers and estuaries buried beneath what is now the seafloor,” Dr Fitch said. “The unique environment of the area around Split, which is quite sheltered, has preserved a lot of it.”
The Adriatic Sea, which divides Croatia from Italy, was once an ancient trade route that connects the prehistoric settlements to the neighboring, larger Mediterranean Sea. 
Past explorations of the Adriatic Sea have also unearthed artificats from the Roman Empire, a shipwreck that dates back 2,200 years, and yet another Hvar settlement that is “almost identical to the Soline settlement” found 15 feet below sea level in the adjacent Gradina Bay, according to the University of Zadar.
“Croatia is the gateway to Europe, so if you think about the advance of farming in Europe, it is and always has been a very important landscape,” Dr. Fitch said.
“Our ultimate goal is to find human artefacts and having this new understanding of the landscape makes that more likely.”