The Guardian reports today on a recent study that claims skull fragments found in Gough Cave in Cheddar Gorge, Somerset, are among the oldest examples found of skull cups.
The cups are around 14,700 years old, from the end of the Ice Age, and are said to be carefully shaped and prepared – de-fleshing a skull was “a skilled and lengthy business”, says one palaeontologist – but whether they were used for rituals or more functional means isn’t clear. They were found alongside bones that showed signs of having been stripped for meat and marrow, suggesting that these early settlers ate their dead, as was reported last year.
