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Archaeologists have uncovered the rare burial of a small child who was buried 8,000 years ago with no bones in his arms and legs, according to a new study.
The child, who was no more than 8 years old, was buried on what is now the island of Alor, Indonesia. During the burial ceremony, the long bones of the child’s arms and legs were removed and placed elsewhere, and part of the child’s face was painted with red ocher, a pigment often used in burials in the ancient world.
“The ocher pigment was applied to the cheeks and forehead and an ocher pebble was placed under the baby’s head when they were buried,” said study lead researcher Sofia Samper Carro, professor of archeology at the Australian National. University of Canberra, he said in a statement.
Related: 8,000-year-old heads on poles found in a mysterious underwater tomb
This is not the only burial in this region with missing arm and leg bones. “The lack of long bones is a practice that has been documented in several other burials of a similar time period in Java, Borneo and Flores, but this is the first time we see it in the burial of a child,” said Samper Carro. . “We don’t know why long bone removal was practiced, but it is likely to be an aspect of the belief system of the people living at the time.”
Archaeologists do not know if the baby was male or female, but an analysis of their teeth and skeleton suggests that the child probably died between the ages of 4 and 8. However, dental analysis suggests that the child was slightly older (6 to 8 years old), while the skeleton was so small, it looked like it belonged to a 4 to 5 year old, indicating that the child’s growth may have been held back by genetic or environmental factors.
“We want to do more paleo-health research to find out if this smaller skeleton is related to diet or the environment or perhaps to being genetically isolated on an island,” said Samper Carro, referring to the idea that some species shrink. when to live on an isolated island, like the extinct dwarf elephants who lived in Flores.
Of course, the ancient adult skulls found on Alor are also small. And if genetics don’t explain their short stature, it’s possible that nutrition played a role, Samper Carro said. “These hunter-gatherers had a predominantly marine diet and there is evidence to suggest that protein saturation from a single food source can cause symptoms of malnutrition, which affects growth,” he said. “However, they could have eaten other terrestrial resources, such as tubers.”
Whatever the researchers learn will shed light on the cultural practices of this region during the first half of the Holocene era, which began at the end of the last ice age about 11,500 years ago. “Child burials are very rare and this complete burial is the only one from this time period,” Carro said.
Child burials have become more common in the archaeological record starting around 3,000 years ago, he said. “But, with nothing from the early Holocene period, we don’t know how the people of this age treated their dead children. This discovery will change things.”
The study was published online Oct. 28 in the journal Quaternary International.
Originally published in Live Science.
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