The Paracas Desert is located on a peninsula in the Pisco province, on the southern coast of Peru. It was here in 1928 that the Peruvian archaeologist Julio Tello made an amazing discovery. He discovered a vast artfully designed cemetery, with graves containing the remains of people with the largest elongated skulls in the world! Nobody has ever found such skulls before. They became known as the "Skulls of Paracas".
Overall, Tello found about 300 of these skulls, which must be about 3,000 years old. Recently, DNA was analyzed on one of the skulls. Expert Brian Foster gave some preliminary information regarding the mysterious skulls.
For the most part, elongated skulls are the result of deliberate deformation of the skull by tying or flattening the head and exposing it over time. This effect was achieved by bandaging the head between two planks, or by pulling the head with a cloth. This method naturally changed the shape of the skull, but the volume, weight, and other characteristics of the human skull remained unchanged.
However, this is not the case with the skulls of Paracas. Their volume is 25 percent larger and 60 percent heavier than that of common human skulls! This means that the skulls of Paracas could not be deformed deliberately in the way described above, using plates or cloth. In addition, these skulls have only one parietal surface, while human skulls have two (outer and inner). And since the features of these skulls are not the result of intentional deformation, the reason why the skulls are elongated remains a mystery.
Juanne Navarro, owner and director of the local Paracas History Museum, which has a collection of 35 Paracas skulls, allowed samples to be taken from five skulls. The sampling process (hair, teeth, skin, bone) has been thoroughly documented with photographs and videos. Samples of the three skulls were sent to geneticists, but the geneticists did not provide any information regarding the origin of the skulls until the completion of genetic testing.
DNA analysis of one of the skulls was completed, and expert Brian Foster spoke about the preliminary results of the analysis:
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“The result revealed mitochondrial DNA with an unknown mutation that is not found in any human, primate or animal. Perhaps we are dealing with a new humanoid creature, very distant from Homo sapiens, Neanderthals or Denisovans"
Brian is not sure if this all fits into the course of our evolution. He noted that people with such skulls have huge biological differences, and therefore they could hardly interbreed with people.
The result of this analysis will be taken into account in subsequent tests and possibly more will be known about the Paracas turtles in the future.