Ancient Buddhist statues were made ​​of meteorite

Ancient Buddhist statue, which was first opened in 1938, the Nazi mission to the year, we study a group of scientists led by Dr. Elmar Buchner from "Planetologicheskogo Institute (Institute of Planetology) and "University of Stuttgart (Universitat Stuttgart), informs.

Probably 1000th sculpture, known as "Iron Man (Iron Man), the weight of which 10 kilograms, depicts the Buddhist God "Vayshravana ​​(Vaisravana) and scientists believe the statue dates back from the pre-Buddhist Bon religion of the 11th century. Geochemical analyzes of the German-Austrian research team showed that the priceless statue was carved out of ataxites- a very rare class of iron meteorites.

The findings, published in Meteorite and Planetary Science, make this an invaluable, since it is made of an iron meteorite rare class.

Statue of "Iron Man" and weighs 10 kg, as scientists believe, is a stylistic hybrid of Buddhist and pre-Buddhist Bon religion, which portrays God "Vayshravana" - the king of the mystical Buddhist country "Shambhala (Jambhala) in Tibet.

The statue was discovered in 1938, the year of the expedition of German scientists led by the famous zoologist Ernst Schaefer. It is not known how the statue was found, but it is believed that a large swastika carved in the center of the figure, made the team to take it to Germany. Once the statue arrived in Munich, she became part of a private collection and are available for research after the auction that took place in the year 2009.

Led the first group of studies the origin of the statue was Dr. Elmar Buchner from the "University of Stuttgart." The team classified the statue, as ataxia - a rare class of iron meteorite with high nickel content.

"The statue was turned from an iron meteorite, but rather from a fragment of a meteorite" Chinge which collapsed in the border regions of Mongolia and Siberia about 15,000 years ago. "Despite the fact that the first fragments were found gold diggers in 1913, we believe that these fragments of the meteorite fell centuries ago," - said Dr. Buchner.

Meteorite prompted to worship many ancient cultures, from the Inuit in Greenland and ending with Australian natives. Even today, one of the most famous places of worship in the world is a Mecca in Saudi Arabia, based on a black stone, which is a fragment of a meteorite.

The team of Dr. Buchner believes that "Iron Man" came from Bon religion of the 11th century. "This statue is the only known source of human figures carved from a meteorite," - said Dr. Buchner. "The origin can evaluate it at $ 20,000; however, if our assessment as to its age is correct, then this statue can be invaluable."