Ottoman-Era Turbah Unearthed in Slovakia

FIL’AKOVO, SLOVAKIA—According to a report in The Slovak Spectator, archaeologist Viktória Tittonová led an investigation of an area of a castle located near what is now the Slovakia-Hungary border. “We found silver coins, ceramics, pipes, knives, and even vessels and sacks with the remains of grains,” she said. The team also uncovered pieces of a turbah, a clay disc that may have been used by Shia Muslims during prayer to symbolize the earth. The turbah is thought to date to the sixteenth or seventeenth centuries, when the town of Fil’akovo was part of the Ottoman Empire. Older fortifications made of wooden palisades were found as well. To read about discoveries made outside Bratislava, Slovakia's capital city, go to “World Roundup.”