SOFIA, Oct 5: A team of Bulgarian archaeologists announced on Tuesday that they had unearthed a large, intact Thracian mausoleum dating back from the fifth century B.C. near the central Bulgarian town of Chipka.

"This mausoleum is very large. It features an incredible architecture and is laden with golden, silver, bronze and earthenware objects," said Georgy Kitov, the head of the team.

The tomb, which is being guarded by a special police unit, includes a 13-meter (40-foot) corridor leading to three rooms, including one which has not yet been opened. Diana Dimitrova, the deputy head of the team, told the Bulgarian news agency that inside one of the rooms they found a golden crown of oak leaves and acorns, the first such object found in a Thracian temple.

Also found were a complete bronze body armor adorned with goddesses, a sword with a gold-studded pommel and three big wine amphoras. Modern Bulgaria is regarded as the geographical cradle of Thracian civilization, which extended from the Caucasus to southwestern Europe from the fourth millennium B.C. to the third century A.C.

But much of Thracian civilization remains a mystery despite major discoveries in recent years. Since 2000, Bulgarian archeologists have unearthed the largest Thracian temple, dating from the 5th and 4th centuries B.C., and the first sanctuary-palace of a Thracian king identified so far, both in southern Bulgaria.

Archeologists estimate that several thousands of sites have yet to be explored. A month ago Kitov's team found an ancient gold funeral mask in Bulgaria's "Valley of the Kings", a region in the centre of the country dotted with dozens of Thracian burial mounds. -AFP