The rapid retreat of glaciers in the Alps is yielding a series of remarkable archeological finds, shedding new light on human activity in the region over millennia. At Col de Barberine, a mountain pass in Switzerland at 7,500 feet elevation, archeologists have uncovered a 2,500-year-old wooden ski, adding to a growing collection of artifacts emerging as ice patches vanish.
Romain Andenmatten, a 42-year-old archeologist working for the canton of Valais, discovered the ski during recent explorations of the diminishing ice in the area. The artifact resembles a similar plank found three years earlier at the same pass, which carbon dating placed in the fifth century BC, during the European Iron Age. That earlier find suggested a hunter or traveler lost the ski while navigating the Alps.
The accelerating ice melt is attributed to unusually low snowfall over the winter followed by an intense summer heatwave, which has significantly depleted Swiss glaciers. Scientists report that Swiss glaciers have lost nearly 20 percent of their volume over the past five years. Projections based on current rates of global warming estimate that up to 97 percent of Alpine glaciers could disappear by the end of the century, a development with critical implications for millions of Europeans who rely on glacier-fed water supplies during dry periods.
The melting glaciers are revealing an array of organic materials—such as wood, leather, textiles, and even preserved human remains—that are rarely preserved in other archeological contexts. Regula Gubler, an archeologist with the canton of Bern, noted the significance of finding leather shoes, woven baskets, and wooden tools, providing a more intimate understanding of early Alpine societies. “Most of what people used and wore was made out of organic materials,” she said, underscoring how the ice acts as a unique time capsule.
Among the finds uncovered in recent years are a wooden bowl from the fifth millennium BC, centuries before the construction of the Egyptian pyramids and Stonehenge, and a birch bark quiver containing flint arrowheads dating back to around 2800 BC. Another curious artifact is a two-foot larch statuette with a human figure on one end and a sharpened point on the other, believed to be from the last two centuries BC, though its purpose remains unknown.
These discoveries are reshaping perceptions of the Alpine environment in prehistory, suggesting that mountain passes were not desolate wilderness but rather vibrant corridors used by hunters, herdsmen, and traders transporting goods such as barrels of wine. The evidence challenges older views of the high Alps as forbidding and uninhabited.
Given the fragility of organic materials once exposed to air, archeologists are racing against time to document and preserve these finds before they deteriorate or are taken by private collectors. To enhance monitoring, the Valais canton developed the IceWatcher app, enabling hikers, shepherds, and others to report potential archaeological discoveries.
In 2024, Andenmatten first visited Restipass after receiving reports via IceWatcher about wooden fragments emerging from an ice patch. Dating indicated some pieces originated from the Bronze Age, possibly serving as markers or sled components. Returning to Col de Barberine this year with colleague David Gucker, Andenmatten found that previously ice-covered slopes were nearly bare, illustrating the accelerating loss of Alpine ice and the urgency to explore and preserve these emerging windows into the past.