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A clay figurine has spent millennia incomplete, resting at the bottom of Lake Bolsena, waiting for its long-dead craftsman to finish the Iron Age-era statuette.

During their work at the underwater archaeological site of Gran Carro di Bolsena in Aiola, Italy, researchers retrieved this rudimentary clay creation from the volcanic lake. The unfinished figure of a woman, dating from between the 10th and 9th centuries BC, appears more like a first draft than a completed piece of art. However, the incomplete statuette still offers many clues about Italian life during the Iron Age.

According to a translated statement from the Superintendency of Archaeology, Fine Arts, and Landscape, part of Italy's Ministry of Cultural Heritage, the palm-sized, feminine-looking statuette is so well-preserved that it “still shows the marks of the fingerprints” of its maker. An imprint of fabric under the chest suggests that the figurine was once “dressed.”

Cultural heritage experts suggest that the figurine is similar to those typically found in funerary contexts, yet it was discovered in a former residential area. This indicates it might have had ritual uses, either as a domestic piece or linked to household rituals within the residential core.

The Underwater Archaeology Service team is credited with the discovery, while the preservation and recovery were managed by the Italian Cultural Property Restoration team working alongside government divers.

The volcanic-rich area of Gran Carro di Bolsena has an obscure history. Divers began uncovering its past in 1991 when researchers identified that the shapeless stones of Aiola were connected to hot thermal water springs. Wooden poles and ceramic fragments on the lake's southwest side were also traced back to the early Iron Age. At least four other similar, albeit smaller, rock formations in the lake indicate the influence of the springs, which emit gas and minerals at temperatures up to 40°C.

In 2020, experts discovered a mound of earth under the stones, the same area where the wood and ceramic originated. This led to the conclusion that Aiola was part of the stilt-house period and integral to the early Iron Age village. Additionally, the discovery of coins and pots from the Constantinian era indicates that the site was inhabited until the late Roman Empire.

The Aiola region holds much more history, and a seemingly insignificant clay figurine reveals the fingerprints of that ancient story.