The Ancient Mystery Unraveled
In the basement of the Penn Museum in Philadelphia, an intriguing discovery was made – a 6,500-year-old human skeleton, nicknamed “Noah,” had been lying undisturbed in a wooden box for 85 years. This remarkable find, originally unearthed by Sir Leonard Woolley during his excavations at the site of Ur in modern-day Iraq between 1929 and 1930, had been considered lost until recently.
The Excavation of a Bygone Era
Woolley’s excavation at Ur is renowned for uncovering the famous Mesopotamian “royal cemetery,” containing hundreds of graves and 16 tombs adorned with cultural artifacts. However, the archaeologist and his team also stumbled upon graves that predated the royal burial ground by approximately 2,000 years.
A Remnant of the Ubaid Period
Buried nearly 50 feet (15 meters) below the surface of Ur, the team discovered 48 graves dating back to the Ubaid period, roughly spanning 5500 B.C. to 4000 B.C. Recognizing the rarity of such remains from this era, Woolley made the decision to recover a single skeleton, coating the bones and surrounding soil in wax, boxing them up, and shipping them to London and eventually Philadelphia.
The Rediscovery and Its Significance
When William Hafford, the project manager responsible for digitalizing the museum’s records, came across a list mentioning two skeletons destined for the Penn Museum, he was perplexed – only one had been accounted for. After extensive research, he approached Janet Monge, the museum’s curator of physical anthropology, who recalled a mysterious box in the basement. Upon opening it, they realized they had stumbled upon the long-lost skeleton, now dubbed “Noah.”
With modern scientific techniques, the Penn Museum researchers aim to unravel the secrets of this ancient individual, shedding light on diet, ancestral origins, trauma, stress, and diseases from a time when a great flood is believed to have occurred at the site of Ur.
