6,500-year-old human tooth found in Serbian museum collection

When archeologists found the tooth it was already damaged, measuring only 23 millimeters. Its crown had been split by agricultural activity into two parts. (Image Courtesy: N. Marković) It sat on a museum shelf for nearly twenty years, unseen, mistaken for something far more common. But now a closer look at a tiny, worn tooth is giving a remarkable glimpse into how Neolithic people in the Balkans may have remembered, and perhaps even honored, the dead, states an archaeology report by Phys Org. If we go by the report, more than 6,500 years ago, someone drilled a hole through a human canine, threaded it on a cord and probably wore it as a pendant. The bizarre artifact was unearthed at the Neolithic site of Jablanica, in Serbia, and is now regarded as the only reliably documented human tooth ornament from the Neolithic central Balkans, adds the report.A bead that was not a beadIt is mentioned in the study that the tooth was found in field surveys at Jablanica, a settlement belonging to the Vinča culture, one of the major societies of prehistoric Europe. Pottery, figurines and finely crafted bone tools were also found at the site, south of Belgrade, since its discovery in the late 19th...