Skull

Face to face with the Netherlands’ first Neanderthal

The young Neanderthal man, known as ‘Krijin’, lived between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago in Doggerland, the prehistoric landscape that lies subsumed in the North Sea.

RIGHT This cranium, found in Harbin City, China, displays a combination of primitive and modern characteristics, leading some researchers to

Ancient human relative identified in China

The fossil human cranium, thought to belong to a male about 50 years old, was found in 1933

The Past

Marble skull is lost Bernini masterpiece for Pope Alexander VII, research reveals

For many years, a life-sized, anatomically accurate and skilfully carved skull of white Carrara marble was on display at Schloss Pillnitz, a castle in Germany. Its artist was unknown.

World news: Indonesia, Germany, Mexico

Earliest known rock art ever found in Indonesia; skulls relating to sacrificial ceremony found in Tenochtitlan; German enigma machine discovered in Bay of Gelting.

Excavations in Mexico City have uncovered a new section of the Huei Tzompantli, an Aztec skull rack.

‘Tower of skulls’ discovered in Tenochtitlan

Excavations in Mexico City have discovered a new section of the Aztec skull rack known as the Huei Tzompantli.

Above This drawing depicts the Forbes’ Quarry skull (also known as Gibraltar 1), the first adult Neanderthal remains ever discovered. The skull was found in Gibraltar in 1848 eight years before the type specimen that gave Neanderthals their name was discovered in the Neander Valley, Germany and came from a woman aged at least 40. Today, it is held by the Natural History Museum in London.

Neanderthal neighbours: tracing evidence for our closest hominin relatives in Britain

Neanderthals have long been stereotyped as our less-capable cousins, but advances in archaeological research have given fascinating new insights into the lives of our closest hominin relatives and the world they inhabited, as Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes explains.

Aztecs: where eagles dare

Buried beneath Mexico City lie the remains of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan and its sacred centre. Lucia Marchini reports on an exhibition investigating wealth, worship, and empire in pre-Hispanic Mexico.

ABOVE Close up images of the cranium, showing evidence of facial trauma (as indicated by the arrows).

Judicial facial mutilation in Anglo-Saxon England?

Anglo-Saxon law codes speak of facial mutilation as a punishment for certain crimes, but until recently no archaeological evidence had been found for it in England. Now the skull of a young woman discovered in Oakridge, Basingstoke, has been identified…