Tuesday 11 September 2012

Ancient human femure

The first image shows a horse radius, and bovine tibia i found not far from the mineralized Human femur, as with almost all the bone i either excavate or just find after flooding in the becks, there was no visible evidence of attention from animals or insects, or the elements.
The images below show an ancient mineralised human male femur it is unusually large and robust.

 Today identified by Anthropologists from Teeside university,  i believe it was washed from the Stainton gravel beds as with the majority of the fossil bone i find and excavate directly from the gravel beds.

The gravel beds have been dated by geologists as over 20 thousand years old, so if ime right this would  make this and other excavated human bone from deep inside the packed ancient Stainton gravel beds, from a time in our past when this area was not supposed to have trees, never mind horses - bovine -  and last but not least humans.  .
When found not far from Stainton village south west Cleveland, the shaft was full of hardened white minerals, maybee calcite. there was no visible damage to the surface of the bone, or evidence of attention from animals or insects. And as with most of the mineralized bone i find in the deep beck valleys of south west Cleveland there was no visible damage by the sun (heat) or water, nore was there any algae attached.