The majority of the artifacts presently located at the Abkhaz Federal Museum in Sukhumi were found in 1959 by local schoolboy (Yuri Voronov), who later became a prominent archaeologist and Caucasiologist.
He collected and saved from destruction over a thousand objects of Tsebelda culture, including spears, axes, jewelry, glass, and clay vessels.
The findings of the young archaeologist interested scientists, and systematic archaeological excavations of the monuments and treasures of Tsebelda culture began as early as 1960.
Materials found at Raskopannoye (Russian: раскопанное), a rich burial site with Byzantine coins of Justinian I (reigned 527–565), have contradicted previous erroneous dating.
One layer of the site was dated to the first through third centuries via the examination of one- and two-part brooches, small glass beads, Roman silver coins with the image of the emperors Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius, and other items.