In a burial mound near the village of Glinoye, Slobodzeya District, archaeologists discovered human bone remains with traces of a surgical operation. The find is more than 4 thousand years old.
An ancient tomb of a representative of the Ingul catacomb culture was discovered in the Slobodzeya region. The bone remains are more than four thousand years old, and the well-preserved skull shows traces of trepanation - a surgical operation to make a hole in the bone tissue. This is the second such find in Transnistria: three years ago, near the village of Glinoe, archaeologists discovered the tomb of a warrior of the same cultural and historical community with similar traces of trepanation.
This year, employees of the Research Laboratory "Archeology" of the Pridnestrovian State University are carrying out excavations on the site of the destroyed embankment of one of the mounds. In the 30s of the XX century, the ancient religious building was turned into a long-term firing point (DOT). Engineering work destroyed much of the structure of the earthen pyramid, but some ancient tombs still survive.
In one of them, archaeologists have found an earthen vessel typical of the Ingul catacomb culture - a community of peoples who inhabited the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region more than four thousand years ago. A geometric ornament has been preserved on the walls of the vessel.
Human bone remains were also found here. Two holes with perfectly straight edges with traces of obliteration, that is, the healing of bone tissue, are visible in the skull.
This indicates that the person lived relatively long after the appearance of these holes in his head, archaeologists say. Moreover, they appeared not as a result of a blow, but as a result of a special surgical operation - trepanation.
So far, experts cannot say with certainty why it was necessary to expose the skull to such a depressurization. It is known that in ancient times trepanation was used for medicinal and ritual purposes. The earliest example of such operations in Eurasia belongs to the Middle Stone Age - the Mesolithic (10-12 thousand years ago). That is, they were produced long before the emergence of highly developed civilizations known to science.
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Whatever the purpose of trepanation, it is obvious that to carry out such manipulations, you need to be very well versed in medicine. Indeed, before the advent of antiseptics, craniotomy was a very risky operation. Even in the 19th century, few survived such intervention. However, archaeological finds indicate that ancient communities were very adept at this technology.
Three years ago, in the same place - in the vicinity of the village of Glinoe - the tomb of a warrior of the Ingul catacomb culture with a similar hole in his head was opened. True, the position of the remaining bones testified to the dismemberment of the buried, which clearly hints at the ritual context.
Judging by the archaeological finds, representatives of this ancient cultural and historical community possessed an extensive store of knowledge. In addition to the facts of craniotomy, stone hammer axes can be cited as an example.
The Archeology Research Laboratory has a whole stand with such antiquities. Their magnificent polishing and amazing symmetry of shapes are striking. Researchers are still arguing about the manufacturing technology of these artifacts. How it was possible to drill an even hole in hard stone without modern tools remains a mystery. It is also unknown how the skull surgeries were performed, which today are performed only in specialized medical institutions.
Alexander Koretsky