The first amputation in history

where did it appear? In Borneo. There is evidence of the first amputation in history. It is estimated to be about 31,000 years old. The clue is provided by the skeleton of a young individual who lost his foot as a child. The patient recovered and lived six to nine years longer. The finding appears in the journal ‘Nature’.

Such an early achievement comes as a surprise. Amputation requires a thorough knowledge of human anatomy and surgical hygiene. The oldest known operation is 7,000 years old. It was performed on a Neolithic farmer in present-day France.

The first amputation in history left traces for archaeologists.
The first amputation in history left traces to archaeologists.

Clean and surgical cut

The reason for the amputation is a mystery. It is unlikely that it was a punishment. Why? The body was carefully buried six to nine years after the surgery. The individual was 19 or 20 years old. There are signs of bone healing at the amputation site.

The leg bone shows a clean cut. This would not be the case if it were an accidental injury. They must have had detailed knowledge of the structure of the limb, muscles and blood vessels.

The first amputation in recorded history was successful. There is no evidence of infection of the remaining part of the left leg. It is possible that he used a ‘crutch’ or support, although there is no archaeological evidence.

It is clear that the wound healed properly after the clean cut.
It is clear that the wound healed adequately after the clean cut.

Protective society

The hunter-gatherer community in which the child lived would have been relatively mobile. They went back and forth in search of food. This would have posed a great challenge to his recovery. A person with an amputated limb needs a lot of rest and rehabilitation.

We do not know what kind of care the child received after the operation. Charlotte Ann Roberts, of Durham University’s Department of Archaeology, explains. She believes that its survival indicates that prehistoric groups were already providing care for the weak and needy. The body was deliberately buried in a cave. This suggests that these considerations continued beyond his death. The researcher recalls that there were already signs of innovative behavior in these societies. One of them was cave art 40,000 years ago.

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