This Man Died 4.5K Years Ago

Scientists use 3D scanning to piece together features of a skull thousands of years old
By Elizabeth Armstrong Moore,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 12, 2017 8:47 AM CDT
This Is the Face of a Man Who Lived 4.5K Years Ago
The blurred sections represent places where forensic experts did not have facial bones to reconstruct.   (Face Lab/Liverpool John Moores University)

We're getting a look at the face of a man who lived 4,500 years ago, thanks to a visual reconstruction by scientists, reports Live Science. Forensic specialists at Liverpool John Moores University, known as Face Lab, were commissioned by the Buxton Museum to digitally re-create the face of a man whose remains were excavated in England in the 1930s and 1980s. They 3D scanned every facial bone available and assembled them on a computer screen like a "jigsaw puzzle," one of the researchers says. Though the team had to blur parts of the man's face where bones were missing, they call the end result "quite striking" and hope it will help people today feel more connected to our ancestors, as one museum rep puts it, "as people rather than a set of bones and hopefully make them interested in the way that they lived."

The man's remains were dug up at a burial mound in Derbyshire, and were stored at the Buxton Museum, reports Archaeology. He was buried with a beaker-like pot and a stone pendant likely worn on his neck. Scientists say that he was 5 feet 7 inches tall, had a fracture in his left elbow that "healed poorly," and died of unknown causes between the ages of 25 and 30. The Face Lab team is now working on reconstructing the face of a 2,700-year-old female Egyptian mummy called Ta-Kesh. (The lab reconstructed the face of Robert the Bruce last year.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X