The Heslington Brain

By Crusader1307

 In all deference to ‘’The Wizard of Oz’’ and ‘’The Scarecrow’’, the truly bizarre and amazing Artifact known as The ‘’Heslington Brain’’ was a discovery in Heslington, Yorkshire, England in 2008. It was during an archaeological excavation of a possible Grave Pit, that a Male Skull was found. When removed from the ground, The Skull appeared ‘’heavier’’ than was usual. Initially, it was thought that earth had filled the cranium. But closer examination yielded a quite unusual find. The cerebral matter, long thought decomposed – was still intact! It would be later found that some 80% of the brain matter remained. But how can this be? Given that The Skull was determined to be over 2,600 years old (between the 6th and 4th Century BC), there should have been no trace of any organic (tissue) matter.

It was also found that The Skull, as stated a Male – was roughly 30 years old. Based on scoring of the surviving vertebrae, The Male had been hung and then decapitated. It is unclear (and probably always will be), if He was a convicted criminal or a human sacrifice to some Pagan God. A few other Grave Goods were found in the long dried up Peat Bog. But this may be why the amazing find was preserved – and also added to it’s mystery. The Brain, as it is – was subjected to some as yet unknown chemical reaction from the Peat and other enzymes. It is this reaction with the Brain material (seeping into the cranium), which preserved it. Slowly replacing the normal fatty tissue with this enzyme – replaced The Brain, but left a palpable material similar to cerebral matter. It will take many years to determine just how or why the enzyme reacted the way it did. And although a few (very few) examples of surviving Brain Matter have been recovered over the years during archaeological excavations – The Heslington brain is the most complete and naturally preserved ever found. The Brain has been further preserved to protect it from reacting to ‘’modern air quality’’ so it can be studied for perhaps many more generations.