See the lifelike face of Zuzu, a man who lived 9,600 years ago in Brazil

Last edited Sun Feb 19, 2023, 05:41 AM - Edit history (1)

By Jennifer Nalewicki published 4 days ago

A facial approximation reveals what Zuzu, a man who lived 9,600 years ago in Brazil, may have looked like.



A side-by-side facial reconstruction of a skull.
Researchers created two facial approximations of Zuzu using photogrammetry of the skull. (Image credit: Moacir Elias Santos and Cícero Moraes)

In 1997, archaeologists unearthed a skeleton buried in the fetal position at Toca dos Coqueiros, an archaeological site in Brazil's Serra da Capivara National Park. Based on the size and shape of the skull, they identified the remains as female and named the skeleton Zuzu. But that classification has remained steeped in controversy(opens in new tab), with many researchers claiming the deceased was actually male.

Now, a new facial approximation of the 9,600-year-old skull may help put this debate to rest.

Last year, researchers took dozens of photos from different angles of the skull, which is on display at the Museum of Nature in Piauí, Brazil. Using photogrammetry, they digitally stitched the 57 photographs together to create a virtual 3D model of the skull "in order to reveal the face of that figure so mysterious and so important to Brazilian history," the researchers wrote in their study(opens in new tab), published Jan. 25.

"Trying to recover the appearance that an individual had in life thousands of years ago is a way to bring them to the present day, bringing them closer to the public," first author Moacir Elias Santos(opens in new tab), an archaeologist with the Ciro Flamarion Cardoso Archaeology Museum in Brazil, told Live Science in an email. "The main interest was to be able to glimpse the face of Zuzu, whose skeleton is one of the most important finds in the Serra da Capivara National Park region."

More:
https://www.livescience.com/see-the-lifelike-face-of-zuzu-a-man-who-lived-9600-years-ago-in-brazil