On why this surgery was performed, he added: "There seem to be three main reasons. The first is to relieve the pressure of a brain haemorrhage; we found traces of blood on the inside of some of the skulls. The second is to treat patients with brain cancer, as we can see pressure traces from the cancer inside some of the skulls. And the final reason was to treat head injuries, which seem to have been quite common. The people of Ikiztepe got their copper from mines in the local mountains, and we think they had to fight other local people for access to it."
He also pointed out other examples of such early skull surgery.
"A few skulls with cut marks have been found at other Bronze Age sites in this region, but other than these I have not found any parallel. There is a Neolithic skull found at a site in central Anatolia with a hole drilled into it. But the surgeons at Ikiztepe were cutting a rectangular opening. It is a much more sophisticated technique," said Bilgi.
Source-ANI