• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

“For Unknown Reasons”: Mystery Of The Oldest Human Remains Ever Found In Antarctica

July 4, 2025 by Deborah Bloomfield

Other than at a research station or occasional expedition, humans have never settled in Antarctica. While the evidence suggests the continent was once home to rainforests, swamps, and dinosaurs, by the time ancient humans made their way out of Africa, it was too cold and remote to support human habitation without modern equipment.

There are suggestions that Polynesian explorer Hui Te Rangiora (sometimes Ui-te-Rangiora), described in Māori legend, reached the continent in the seventh century CE. That legend describes the seafarer reaching “a foggy, misty, and dark place not seen by the sun” and describes a bare, icy environment, leading researchers to suggest that they may have traversed Antarctic waters, and even seen the continent. 

But the next confirmed sighting of Antarctica didn’t come until 1820, as Russian explorer Thaddeus von Bellingshausen described seeing an “ice shore of extreme height” during an expedition to the Antarctic. In the following decades and century, humans explored the continent further, sometimes at the cost of their lives.

Which is why it’s so weird that, in the 1980s, a scientist discovered human remains in Antarctica of a young woman thought to have died between 1819 and 1825.

“On January 7th, 1985, at 16:35, during the process of collecting marine refuse on Yámana Beach of the Cape’s coast, I made the first discovery of human remains: a cranium half buried in the rocky sandy sector of the beach,” Daniel Torres Navarro, Professor of Biology and Natural Sciences at the University of Chile explained of his discovery in a paper.

“Only the parieto-occipital portion was visible, while the frontal, naso-maxillar and parietal portions were buried in the sand. The surface of the exposed area was greenish due to the proliferation of microalgae. Upon retrieval, it was, nevertheless, still possible to recover two maxillar fragments with some well preserved teeth. A thorough search failed to produce the two central incisors, nor did a further search in the surrounding area lead to the discovery of other human remains (mandible, vertebrae, etc.).”

Initial examinations showed that the cranium belonged to a young individual, and most likely a female. But you don’t find human remains on Antarctica and leave it at that. Torres Navarro and others returned to investigate the site and nearby over the years, finding further bones including a femur at a nearby site. The team presumed any further skeletal remains to be “widely dispersed” over the Yamana Beach. 

According to the team’s analysis, she was likely from Chile, and died sometime between 1819 and 1825. So, how did she get there, perhaps even beating Thaddeus von Bellingshausen to sighting the continent?

“Turning to the possible origins of these human remains, I would like to put forth the hypothesis that, for unknown reasons, the woman could have been a member of a group of 19th-century sealers who abandoned her at the site,” Torres Navarro explains in his discussion.

“Another possibility is that she would have died on board of a vessel and been buried into the sea, as was the custom of the days. This could have caused the body to be transported by the action of currents and storms to the beach, where it was consumed by carrion eaters (giant petrel, Macronectes giganteus; skuas, Catharacta lonnbergi; kelp gull, Larus dominicanus and sheathbill, Chionis alba). The birds could have separated the cranium from the rest of the body, leading to the loss of the mandible and missing teeth. The bones could then have been dispersed over a wide area and buried under sand.”

“Whatever the chain of events, only those remains here mentioned have been found up to this day.”

Deborah Bloomfield
Deborah Bloomfield

Related posts:

  1. Belarus leader warns on NATO troops in Ukraine, migrant ‘catastrophe’
  2. Jurassic Bleurgh: Prehistoric Predator’s Fossilized Vomit Reveals Amphibious Meatloaf
  3. Team Creates First Humanoid Robot Pilot, That Can Really Fly Planes
  4. Cannibalistic Funerals, Necropants, And A Biological Bomb For A Tomb: 9 Tales From The Darker Side Of Science

Source Link: "For Unknown Reasons": Mystery Of The Oldest Human Remains Ever Found In Antarctica

Filed Under: News

Primary Sidebar

  • Why Is There No Nobel Prize For Mathematics?
  • These Are The Only Animals Known To Incubate Eggs In Their Stomachs And Give “Birth” Out Their Mouths
  • Constipated? This One Fruit Could Help, Says First-Ever Evidence-Led Diet Guidance
  • NGC 2775: This Galaxy Breaks The Rules Of “Galactic Evolution” And Baffles Astronomers
  • Meet The “Four-Eyed” Hirola, The World’s Most Endangered Antelope With Fewer Than 500 Left
  • The Bizarre 1997 Experiment That Made A Frog Levitate
  • There’s A Very Good Reason Why October 1582 On Your Phone Is Missing 10 Days
  • Skynet-1A: Military Spacecraft Launched 56 Years Ago Has Been Moved By Persons Unknown
  • There’s A Simple Solution To Helping Avoid Erectile Dysfunction (But You’re Not Going To Like It)
  • Interstellar Object 3I/ATLAS May Be 10 Billion Years Old, This Rare Spider Is Half-Female, Half-Male Split Down The Middle, And Much More This Week
  • Why Do Trains Not Have Seatbelts? It’s Probably Not What You Think
  • World’s Driest Hot Desert Just Burst Into A Rare And Fleeting Desert Bloom
  • Theoretical Dark Matter Infernos Could Melt The Earth’s Core, Turning It Liquid
  • North America’s Largest Mammal Once Numbered 60 Million – Then Humans Nearly Drove It To Extinction
  • North America’s Largest Ever Land Animal Was A 21-Meter-Long Titan
  • A Two-Headed Fossil, 50/50 Spider, And World-First Butt Drag
  • Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Is Losing Buckets Of Water Every Second – And It’s Got Cyanide
  • “A Historic Shift”: Renewables Generated More Power Than Coal Globally For First Time
  • The World’s Oldest Known Snake In Captivity Became A Mom At 62 – No Dad Required
  • Biggest Ocean Current On Earth Is Set To Shift, Spelling Huge Changes For Ecosystems
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version