Idol is covered in mysterious carvings which have yet to be deciphered, but could depict snakes, danger and even spirits in different worlds

Perfectly-preserved wooden statue was thought to be 9,500 years old

A stunning wooden statue pulled from a Russian peat bog 125 years ago has been dated as being 11,000 years old after 'sensational' new analysis.

This means the remarkable Shigir Idol, which is covered in ‘encrypted code’ and may be a message from ancient man, is by far the oldest wooden sculpture in the world.

Previous dating attempts claimed it was made 9,500 years ago.

By comparison, Stonehenge dates back 4,614 years, while the haunting Russian wooden sculpture is also more than twice as old as the Egyptian pyramids.

The remarkable Shigir Idol (pictured) which is covered in ‘encrypted code’ and may be a message from ancient man, is the oldest wooden sculpture in the world

Earlier attempts to date the Shigir Idol put as having been carved 9,500 years ago.

But in fact, it is one and a half millennia older, according to the latest research by German scientists.

'We can say the results are sensational,' a source at Sverdlovsk Regional History Museum told The Siberian Times.

The museum said the dating used the world's most sophisticated technology and was undertaken to remove doubts about the age of the idol.

The Shigir Idol is covered in carvings, including what looks like code. It stands 9.2ft (2.8 metres) in height (shown left and right) but originally was 17.4ft (5.3 metres) tall - as high as a two storey house

WHAT DO THE MARKINGS MEAN? The Shigir Idol is covered in carvings, including what looks like code. Professor Mikhail Zhilin, leading researcher of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Archeology said: 'The ornament is covered with nothing but encrypted information. People were passing on knowledge with the help of the Idol.' While the messages remain 'an utter mystery to modern man', the Russian academic said its creators 'lived in total harmony with the world, had advanced intellectual development, and a complicated spiritual world'. Svetlana Savchenko, chief keeper of Shigir Idol at Yekaterinburg History Museum, concluded that 'a straight line could denote land, or horizon - the boundary between earth and sky, water and sky, or the borderline between the worlds. 'A wavy line or zigzag symbolised water, snake, lizard, or determined a certain border. 'In addition, the zigzag signalled danger, like a pike. Cross, rhombus, square, circle depicted the fire or the sun, and so on.' But the marks could have multiple meanings for the ancient makers who gave the idol seven faces, only one of which is in 3D. 'If these are images of spirits that inhabited the human world in ancient times, the vertical position of figures (one above the other) probably relate to hierarchy,' said Petr Zolin. 'Images on the front and back planes of the Idol, possibly indicate that they belong to different worlds. 'If there are depicted myths about the origin of humans and the world, the vertical arrangement of the images may reflect the sequence of events. Ornaments can be special signs which mark something as significant.' Mr Savchenko argues that the idol tells the story of the 'creation of the world' as understood by Mesolithic man. Advertisement

The idol was originally dug out of a peat bog in the Ural Mountains in 1890.

'The first attempt to date the idol was made 107 years after its discovery, in 1997.

The first radiocarbon analyses showed the idol was 9,500 calendar years old, which led to disputes in the scientific community.

'To exclude doubts, and to make the results known and accepted, a decision was made to use the most modern technologies to date the idol again,’ the source said.

'Research was conducted in Mannheim, Germany, at one of the world's most advanced laboratories using Accelerated Mass Spectrometry, on seven minuscule wooden samples.

'The results were astonishing, as samples from inside parts of the idol showed its age as 11,000 calendar years, to the very beginning of the Holocene epoch.

'We also learned that the sculpture was made from a larch which was at least 157 years old.

‘Clear cuts on the tree trunk leave no doubts that the idol was made from a freshly cut tree, by stone tools.'

The source concluded: 'The research proves that the Big Shigir Idol is the world's oldest wooden sculpture, and an outstanding discovery, a key to understanding Eurasian art.'

The peat bog preserved the idol 'as if in a time capsule' on the western fringes of Siberia.

The ancient monument stands 9ft (2.8 metres) in height but originally was 17ft (5.3 metres) tall - as high as a two storey house.

In the Soviet era, two metres of the ancient artefact went missing, though drawings were made of it by pre-revolutionary archaeologist Vladimir Tolmachev.

Professor Mikhail Zhilin, lead researcher of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Archaeology, has spoken previously of his 'feeling of awe' when studying the idol.

'This is a masterpiece, carrying gigantic emotional value and force,' he said.

'It is a unique sculpture, there is nothing else in the world like this.

It is very alive, and very complicated at the same time.

'The ornament is covered with nothing but encrypted information. People were passing on knowledge with the help of the idol.'

'The research proves that the Big Shigir Idol is the world's oldest wooden sculpture, and an outstanding discovery, a key to understanding Eurasian art,' The Siberian Times' source said. The 3D face of the sculpture is shown front-on, left and in profile, right

The idol was discovered in 1890 in Kirovgrad (marked on the map), Sverdlovsk region, in the Ural Mountains. The peat bog preserved the idol 'as if in a time capsule' on the western fringes of Siberia

While the messages remain 'an utter mystery to modern man', it was clear that the figure’s creators 'lived in total harmony with the world, had advanced intellectual development, and a complicated spiritual world', he said.

The markings and hieroglyphics could have multiple meanings for the ancient statue-makers who gave the idol seven faces, only one of which is three-dimensional, say academics.

'If these are images of spirits that inhabited the human world in ancient times, the vertical position of figures (one above the other) probably relate to their hierarchy,' said author Petr Zolin, citing scientific work by Svetlana Savchenko, chief keeper of Shigir Idol, and Zhilin.

Archaeologists believe Egypt’s pyramids were built by an Old Kingdom society that lived in the Nile Valley after 3000BC. Historical analysis claims that the Egyptians built the Giza Pyramids in a span of 85 years between 2589 and 2504 BC

Professor Mikhail Zhilin, lead researcher of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Archaeology, has spoken previously of his 'feeling of awe' when studying the idol (shown). He said: 'The ornament is covered with nothing but encrypted information. People were passing on knowledge with the help of the idol'

'Images on the front and back planes of the idol, possibly indicate that they belong to different worlds.

'If there are depicted myths about the origin of humans and the world, the vertical arrangement of the images may reflect the sequence of events.

Ornaments can be special signs which mark something as significant.'