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

A partial skull from practically 8,000 years in the past that was found by two kayakers in a river final summer will probably be returned to Native American officers in Minnesota

ByThe Related Press

21 May 2022, 19:10

• 3 min read

REDWOOD FALLS, Minn. -- A partial skull that was discovered last summer time by two kayakers in Minnesota will likely be returned to Native American officers after investigations determined it was about 8,000 years outdated.

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

Pondering it may be related to a missing individual case or murder, Hable turned the cranium over to a health worker and eventually to the FBI, where a forensic anthropologist used carbon courting to determine it was seemingly the cranium of a younger man who lived between 5500 and 6000 B.C., Hable stated.

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

The anthropologist determined the man had a despair in his skull that was “perhaps suggestive of the cause of demise.”

After the sheriff posted in regards to the discovery on Wednesday, his office was criticized by a number of Native Individuals, who said publishing photos of ancestral stays was offensive to their tradition.

Hable stated his workplace removed the put up.

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

Hable mentioned the remains shall be turned over to Upper Sioux Group tribal officials.

Minnesota Indian Affairs Council Cultural Sources Specialist Dylan Goetsch stated in a press release that neither the council nor the state archaeologist were notified in regards to the discovery, which is required by state laws that govern the care and repatriation of Native American stays.

Goetsch stated the Fb publish “showed an entire lack of cultural sensitivity” by failing to name the individual a Native American and referring to the remains as “a bit of piece of history.”

Kathleen Blue, a professor of anthropology at Minnesota State College, mentioned Wednesday that the cranium was undoubtedly from an ancestor of one of the tribes nonetheless residing within the area, The New York Instances reported.

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

“There’s probably not that many individuals at the moment wandering round Minnesota 8,000 years in the past, because, like I said, the glaciers have solely retreated just a few 1000's years before that,” Blue mentioned. “That period, we don’t know a lot about it.”