Unesco team to examine claims of Europe's first ancient pyramid

Bosnia: Researchers from Unesco are to examine a hill near Sarajevo where a businessman-cum-archaeologist claims to have found Europe's first ancient pyramid.

International experts have poured scorn on Semir Osmanagic's theory that Visocica hill is actually a 213m (700ft) pyramid built about 12,000 years ago by ancestors of the Illyrians, whom historians believe were the first inhabitants of the Balkans.

Far from withdrawing his claim, however, Mr Osmanagic insists Visocica is only the first discovery in a remarkable Bosnian "Valley of the Pyramids" which will necessitate the rewriting of European and world history.

"Visocica hill has three almost-perfect triangular sides, each pointing towards cardinal points [ of the compass]," said Sarajevo-born Mr Osmanagic, who has explored and studied Central American pyramids for the last 15 years from his base in Texas.

"This and its pyramid shape were enough for me," he added. "Nature simply could not build such perfect objects.

"The history of civilisation has to be rewritten. Bosnia will become a giant on the world archaeological map."

Mr Osmanagic, whom local media have dubbed "Bosnia's Indiana Jones" and who often sports the kind of bush hat worn by the archaeologist action hero, funded excavations that he claimed has unearthed carved stone blocks that were clearly man-made. He also insisted the valley below Visocica - his "Pyramid of the Sun" - was riddled with tunnels linking several pyramids, all of which appear to be ordinary hills.

An Egyptian geologist working with Mr Osmanagic said he also believed the trees and undergrowth hid ancient pyramids. European specialists however are not convinced.

"My opinion and the opinion of my colleagues is that what we saw was entirely geological in nature," said Anthony Harding, the head of the European Association of Archaeologists, after a visit to the site this week.

Before his visit, Prof Harding told Reuters: "Even if we assume these people have the date wrong by several millennia and they are actually nearer in date to the Egyptian pyramids, the idea that people in Bosnia at that time were building pyramids of any sort, let alone enormous ones that dwarf even the Great Pyramid at Giza, is pure fantasy."

Unesco secretary general Koichiro Matsuura told Bosnian media that researchers would be dispatched before the end of August "to determine exactly what it is all about".

They are expected to start work before the end of August.