Hallstatt Archaeological Site in Vače

Archaeological investigations near Vače—north of Klenik and east of Slemšek Hill (680 metres or 2,230 feet)—revealed foundations of a number of houses and graves from an Iron Age Illyrian settlement.

[2] Prince Ernst Windischgrätz (1827–1918) directed excavations from 1879 to 1881, followed by the Academy of Sciences in Vienna in 1881.

[1]: 286–287 In 1882, the Vače Situla was found in the Ronkar Ravines (Slovene: Ronkarjeve drage, part of Klenik) by the local farmer Janez Grilc from the Pleze Farm, who sold it to Provincial Museum of Carniola.

Further excavations were carried out by Princess Marie of Windisch-Graetz in 1905, 1907, and 1913, by Walter Schmid (1875–1951) from 1932 to 1935, and by France Stare (1924–1974) in 1945.

Some of them were sold to museums in Harvard, Oxford and Berlin by Duchess Marie Antoinette of Mecklenburg, a daughter of the princess who surveyed some excavations.