News Section | Evolution
Prehistoric skull shows earliest evidence of human violence
A healed fracture found on an ancient skull from China may be the oldest documented evidence of violence among humans, researchers say.
The individual, who lived 150,000-200,000 years ago, suffered blunt force trauma to the right temple – possibly from being hit with a projectile.
But he or she (the sex is unclear) survived that blow and the injury was completely healed by the time of the person’s death.
“Can we completely rule out a hunting accident? No. But it’s less likely to be that than getting hit on the side of the head with a missile,” BBC news quoted co-author of the study, Erik Trinkaus from Washington University in St Louis, USA.
“But this is the first one I’m aware of where the most likely interpretation is getting whooped by someone else – to put it bluntly,” he said.
Even after sustaining the injury, this individual survived for weeks or months ‘at least’, based on the completely healed state of the fracture.
Survival even after such trauma is important to researchers, as they believe it points to the existence of care and support networks within ancient human groups.
“They hit each other, they squabbled, they had weaponry – so it became serious. But at the same time, they were helping each other out,” said Trinkaus.
The details of the study are published in PNAS journal.
Disclaimer: Bioscholar is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. The articles are based on peer reviewed research, and discoveries/products mentioned in the articles may not be approved by the regulatory bodies.