crystal skull
Sign in to savehuman skull stone carvings made of clear quartz, claimed to be pre-Columbian Mesoamerican
Described at
| British Museum
britishmuseum.org →Link to a page describing this subject · 40,000 chars · not written by Vinony
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- work of art
- Depicts
- skull
- Material used
- quartz
- Collection
- British Museum
- Location
- British Museum
- Image
- Crystal skull british museum random9834672.jpg
- Height
- 25
Show 8 more facts
- Commons category
- Crystal skulls
- inventory number
- Am1898,-.1
- title
- The Crystal Skull
- inception
- 1881-00-00
- location of discovery
- Mexico
- described at URL
- www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/E_Am1898-1
- fabrication method
- carving
- topic's main category
- Category:Crystal skull
Sources (2)
via Wikidata · CC0
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Encyclopedic overview
The crystal skull at the British Museum, similar in dimensions to the more detailed Mitchell-Hedges skull
Crystal skulls are human skull hardstone carvings made of clear, milky white or other types of quartz (also called "rock crystal"), claimed to be pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artifacts by their alleged finders; however, these claims have been refuted for all of the specimens made available for scientific studies. The results of these studies demonstrated that those examined were manufactured in the mid-19th century or later, almost certainly in Europe, during a time when interest in ancient culture abounded. The skulls appear to have been crafted in Germany, quite likely at workshops in the town of Idar-Oberstein, which was renowned for crafting objects made from imported Brazilian quartz in the late 19th century.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “crystal skull” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.