Copper Age woman survived two skull surgeries up to 4,500 years ago
Copper Age woman survived two skull surgeries up to 4,500 years ago
Multiple holes in a skull found at a burial site in Spain were the result of prehistoric surgeries.
Thousands of years ago, a woman underwent two surgeries to her head — and survived both procedures, her skull reveals.
Scientists in Spain made the discovery after analyzing the woman's skeletal remains, which were unearthed at a Copper Age burial site known as Camino del Molino, located in Caravaca de la Cruz in southeastern Spain, according to a study published in the December issue of the International Journal of Paleopathology.
The woman, who was between 35 and 45 years old when she died, was one of 1,348 individuals found at the funerary site, which was used from 2566 to 2239 B.C. However, unlike the other skeletons, her skull showed evidence of a series of trepanations, which are surgical procedures that involved drilling or scraping holes through the skull to expose the dura mater, the outermost layer of tissue surrounding the brain and spinal cord, as a form of medical treatment.
If the surgeries were so good then why is she dead?
Every surgery ultimately results in a fatality eventually.
Ooh, my favorite surgery factoid... Robert Liston had a patient die of infection after a surgery, as did his assistant, whose fingers he accidentally amputated in the process. A witness to this event died of shock.
Liston's surgery had a 300% fatality rate.
The curse of surgery!
Researchers think she lived several months after the second surgery.
Success!
She may have survived them, but she didn't enjoy them.
Bruv, that sounds fucking brutal.
Collections can finally stop looking for her...