Finding a brain inside a skull is a routine task for your modern zombie, but it came as a bit of a shock to Rachel Cubbit, Finds Officer at the University of York – especially as the skull in question had been buried sometime before the Roman invasion of Britain, around 43 AD.
The gray matter had contracted quite a bit during the time underground, so it’s not quite clear how much is left. The strangest thing about it though, is that the skull (with brain still inside) was buried separately from the body. This would seem to suggest that ritual burial or human sacrifice were being practiced.
To find soft tissue like this is pretty amazing anyway, although it’s not the oldest, as there were some 8,000 year old brains found in a peat bog in Florida.
It’s unlikely we’ll get any neurological insight into the ways of the past, but the archaeologists have it safely under lock and key at York University, near where it was found. You know, just in case that Jurassic Park theory works.
Published: Dec 12, 2008 08:44 pm