The 3D reconstruction of a Palaeolithic skull has revealed the earliest evidence of a brain injury caused by violence to a child.
The skull, belonging to a 12- to 13-year-old, was discovered at the entrance to a cave in Oafzeh, in lower Galilee, Israel, and dates to the Middle Palaeolithic, c.100,000 years ago. Damage to the bone was caused by major blunt-force trauma to the head. Hélène Coqueugniot and her colleagues from CNRS Université de Bordeaux and EPHE, writing in PLOS ONE, say that the 3D brain-reconstruction reveals the injury would have caused serious brain damage, resulting in personality changes as well as problems with social communication. Such wounds are typically caused by fighting, but we cannot know if the blow was deliberate or accidental. However, though brain impairment would have affected the youngster’s social abilities, the child was buried with rituals and care, with two deer antlers placed on the chest, ‘raising the question of compassion in prehistory,’ says Coqueugniot.