Almost 8,000-year-old skull present in Minnesota River

A partial cranium from nearly 8,000 years ago that was discovered by two kayakers in a river final summer season might be returned to Native American officials in Minnesota

ByThe Related Press

21 May 2022, 19:10

• 3 min learn

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

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

Pondering it is likely to be associated to a missing person case or murder, Hable turned the skull over to a health worker and ultimately to the FBI, the place a forensic anthropologist used carbon relationship to determine it was seemingly the cranium of a young man who lived between 5500 and 6000 B.C., Hable mentioned.

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

The anthropologist decided the person had a depression in his skull that was “maybe suggestive of the reason for loss of life.”

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

Hable mentioned his office removed the publish.

"We didn’t imply for it to be offensive in anyway,” Hable mentioned.

Hable mentioned the remains will likely be turned over to Higher Sioux Group tribal officers.

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

Goetsch said the Fb publish “showed a whole lack of cultural sensitivity” by failing to name the individual a Native American and referring to the stays as “slightly piece of history.”

Kathleen Blue, a professor of anthropology at Minnesota State University, stated Wednesday that the cranium was positively from an ancestor of one of the tribes nonetheless living within the space, The New York Times reported.

She stated the young man would have doubtless eaten a food regimen of crops, deer, fish, turtles and freshwater mussels in a small region, moderately than following mammals and bison on their migrations.

“There’s most likely not that many individuals at the moment wandering round Minnesota 8,000 years ago, as a result of, like I mentioned, the glaciers have solely retreated a few hundreds years before that,” Blue said. “That period, we don’t know much about it.”