Researchers were exploring a cave in East Kalimantan Borneo in 2020,in a rainforest region known for having some of the earliest rock art in the world,when they came across the grave,said Dr Tim Maloney,an archaeologist at Griffith University in Queensland and the study’s lead researcher.
Though much of the skeleton was intact,it was missing its left foot and the lower part of its left leg,he said. After examining the remains,the researchers concluded the foot bones weren’t missing from the grave,or lost in an accident — they had been carefully removed.
The remaining leg bone showed a clean,slanted cut that healed over,Maloney said. There were no signs of infection,which would be expected if the child’s leg had been bitten off by a creature such as a crocodile. And there were also no signs of a crushing fracture,which would have been expected if the leg had snapped off in an accident.
The person appears to have lived for about six to nine more years after losing the limb,eventually dying from unknown causes as a young adult,researchers say.
This shows that the Stone Age foragers knew enough about medicine to perform the surgery without fatal blood loss or infection,the authors concluded.
Researchers do not know what kind of tool was used to amputate the limb,nor how infection was prevented,but they speculate that a sharp stone tool may have made the cut,and point out that some of the rich plant life in the region has medicinal properties.