Stone presumably from the 5th century

This is a story about a stone found in close proximity of our land when we were digging for water and electricity line near Pula in Croatia

While digging we were discovering walls in a depth of about one to one and a half meter and finaly the guy who was digging with a dozer lifted this stone from where it fell probably centuries ago

We have no idea what it was used for. I am only guessing that it could be a stone step of a sort.

It is about 140 cm in length, 50 cm in width and about 15 cm thick

It has a stone ledge about 5 cm thick. The stone step weighs about 400 kilos or even more.

Of course that is just a rough estimate as 4 people were not able to lift it and carry it so the machine did.

And it has three evenly cut lines in a side of a stone, each 7 cm apart, making it 21 cm in hight at a side point of a ledge.

It has three holes. two at one and one at the other side of the stone each about 5 cm in diameter and 5 cm deep.

Because of the holes I presume that this is the bottom side of the step of a sort that was maybe stuck onto small round stone stakes, preventing a step to slide.

Of course this is only my speculation.

The very very old people in the vilage (about 90 years old at that time)used to tell my father about 40 years ago that their grandfathers told them there was an old Roman fortress centuries ago. Those are the same ones that built the Colloseum in Pula.

The stone is slightly damaged at one side, probably from the fall from wherever all those centuries ago.

The old people also told my father that at that time there was a plague that killed all the soldiers and people in that area and that's why the fortress was left to ruin and later forgotten where it was standing only couple of old people that are today long dead remembered the stories their grandfathers used to tell them.

Besides the hude amount of perfectly cut stones binded with the sort of old cement and the stone walls still standing under the surface there were couple of more stone artifacts like a half of the round stone with the hole in the middle.

Anyway, if anyone has any idea what this sort of stone step was used for, I would be much oblidged to learn about it.

Some people that saw it say it is very valuable ... ¨

At the moment I am at most interested to know its purpose which doesn't mean that some obscene amounts of money won't persuade me to sell it ;)