Nearly 8,000-year-old cranium found in Minnesota River

A partial skull from practically 8,000 years ago that was found by two kayakers in a river last summer season might be returned to Native American officers in Minnesota

ByThe Associated Press

21 Might 2022, 19:10

• 3 min read

REDWOOD FALLS, Minn. -- A partial cranium that was discovered final summer season by two kayakers in Minnesota might be returned to Native American officials after investigations decided it was about 8,000 years old.

The kayakers discovered the cranium in the drought-depleted Minnesota River about 110 miles (180 kilometers) west of Minneapolis, Renville County Sheriff Scott Hable mentioned.

Thinking it may be associated to a missing particular person case or homicide, Hable turned the cranium over to a medical examiner and ultimately to the FBI, the place a forensic anthropologist used carbon dating to determine it was likely the cranium of a young man who lived between 5500 and 6000 B.C., Hable stated.

"It was a whole shock to us that that bone was that outdated,” Hable told Minnesota Public Radio.

The anthropologist decided the man had a despair in his cranium that was “perhaps suggestive of the reason for death.”

After the sheriff posted about the discovery on Wednesday, his workplace was criticized by several Native Individuals, who stated publishing photos of ancestral remains was offensive to their culture.

Hable mentioned his office removed the put up.

"We didn’t mean for it to be offensive by any means,” Hable said.

Hable stated the stays might be turned over to Higher Sioux Neighborhood tribal officials.

Minnesota Indian Affairs Council Cultural Assets Specialist Dylan Goetsch said in a press release that neither the council nor the state archaeologist have been notified concerning the discovery, which is required by state legal guidelines that govern the care and repatriation of Native American stays.

Goetsch mentioned the Facebook post “confirmed a complete lack of cultural sensitivity” by failing to call the person a Native American and referring to the remains as “a bit of piece of history.”

Kathleen Blue, a professor of anthropology at Minnesota State University, stated Wednesday that the cranium was definitely from an ancestor of one of many tribes still dwelling within the area, The New York Occasions reported.

She mentioned the young man would have likely eaten a diet of crops, deer, fish, turtles and freshwater mussels in a small area, slightly than following mammals and bison on their migrations.

“There’s probably not that many individuals at the moment wandering around Minnesota 8,000 years in the past, as a result of, like I mentioned, the glaciers have only retreated a few 1000's years earlier than that,” Blue said. “That period, we don’t know a lot about it.”