Surprised by the restored face of the 8,000-year-old man

Swedish archaeologist successfully recreated the face of a man who lived during the Stone Age in Motala, Sweden, 8,000 years ago.

In 2012, archeologists found an 8,000-year-old stone age burial site in Motala, Sweden.

At the burial site, the archaeological team discovered the skulls of 11 adults and 1 newborn, but only 1 adult and the infant remained intact.

Picture 1 of Surprised by the restored face of the 8,000-year-old man
Face of 8,000-year-old man after reconstruction.

From one of the no-functioning skulls, archaeologist and sculptor specializing in facial reconstruction, Swedish Oscar Nilsson tried to restore the complete face.

To do this, Nilsson firstly scans the skull to create virtual 3D images. He then used the data obtained from the CT scan to print a plastic copy of the skull with a 3D printer.

Based on measurements of the skull, Nilsson continued to create jaws for the Stone Age man.

Previous DNA analysis showed that the man may have dark brown hair, blue eyes and most likely around the age of 50.

The skull has a 2.5 cm long wound, a sign that this person was injured from something similar to that blunt. But the scar healed before the man died. Therefore it can be concluded that the blow only caused trauma, not his life.

From there Nilsson created scar tissue for the wound and left the man's hair fairly short to reveal the scar.

The bust reconstructed by Nilsson is now on display in Motala, Sweden.

In the past, Nilsson had restored the face of a noblewoman from Peru 1,200 years ago.