Weird Skeletons in Mankind's Closet

From Stephen Wagner,

From 9-ft. giants to tiny mummies, these human remains are puzzling

In 2004, scientists were stunned by the discovery of skeletons of what are thought to be an ancient race of people that stood about 31/2 feet tall - about the height of a modern three-year-old.

Found on the remote island of Indonesia, these pygmies were named Homo floresiensis and nicknamed "hobbits" because of their small size (their heads were no bigger than a grapefruit). The scientists believe this diminutive race died out about 13,000 years ago, although modern natives reported knowledge of a tiny race of people currently or recently living in isolated areas of the jungle.

These are not the first or only strange skeletons unearthed around the world - including the U.S.

Whether you believe humans are the descendents of Adam and Eve, the result of millions of years of evolution or the genetic creations of the Annunaki, there are many puzzling specimens of skeletons, skulls and other human (or human-like) remains that can truly make one wonder about mankind's past.

Here's a bare-bones look at some of the more intriguing cases:

Horny Devils

Within an ancient burial mound near the town of Sayre in Bradford County, Pennsylvania, skeletons measuring approximately 7 feet in length were discovered in the 1800s.

But the most remarkable feature of these tall skeletons was not their height, but the strange horn-like protrusions above the brow region on their skulls. It was estimated that they were buried around 1200 AD. According to some sources, the skeletons were sent to the American Investigating Museum in Philadelphia, and vanished.

All the Better to Eat You With, My Dear

In 1888, seven skeletons, which had been placed in a sitting position, were uncovered from a burial mound near Clearwater, Minnesota. The highly unusual skulls of these beings had double rows of teeth in both the upper and lower jaws.

It was also noted that the foreheads were low and sloping, compared to "normal" human skulls, and had distinctly prominent brows.

Copper Man

The December 17, 1891 issue of the respected journal Nature reported the discovery of a giant man buried 14 feet within the center of one of Ohio's mysterious burial mounds. The enormous man's arms, jaw, arms, chest and stomach were all clad in copper.

Wooden antlers, also covered with copper, rested on either side of his head. His mouth was filled with large pearls, and a pearl-studded necklace of bear teeth hung around his neck. Who this man was, or to which race of people he belonged, is unknown.

The Mica Giant

In 1879, a burial mound in Brewersville, Indiana yielded another giant skeleton, according to the November, 1975 edition of The Indianapolis News. This one reached 9 feet 8 inches tall!

It wore a necklace of mica stone, and a crude human effigy of clay was found standing at his feet. The giant skeleton was examined by scientists from Indiana and New York, and it remained in the possession of Mr. Robinson, who owned the land on which the mound stood. Unfortunately, the curious bones were washed away in a flood in 1937.

Coneheads

Researcher Robert Connolly photographed this strange elongated skull in 1995. It was found in South America and is estimated to be tens of thousands of years old. Apart from its obvious abnormalities, it also exhibits characteristics of both Neanderthal and human skulls - impossible in itself, according to anthropology texts, since Neanderthals did not exist in South America.

Some believe that the unusual shape of the skulls might be the result of a primitive practice known as "skull binding" in which a person's head is tightly bound with cloth or leather straps throughout his lifetime, causing the skull to grow in this dramatic way. The skull-binding theory is contested, however, for this and other cone-shaped skulls.

Small Wonders

Near Coshocton, Ohio in 1837, several fully developed adult skeletons were found buried in tiny wooden coffins. Why tiny coffins? Because these adult skeletons were only 3 to 41/2 feet tall.

No artifacts were found with the remains that might give clues as to who these small people were, but there were so many of them that researchers believed they could have been the residents of a small city.

Pedro Mountain Mummy

"Pedro," as he has been nicknamed, is one of the most famous enigmatic human remains ever found. He was discovered by gold prospectors in 1932 when they were dynamiting through the canyons of the Pedro Mountains, which rise about 60 miles southwest of Casper, Wyoming.

There he was, sitting cross-legged on a ledge with his hands resting serenely in his lap. He was completely mummified. What's astonishing, however, is that this middle-aged-looking man appeared to be only 14 inches tall! But it might not have been an adult at all.

Although the mummy has been lost, X-rays survive and one modern analysis concluded that Pedro was actually an infant, or even a fetus, that might have been afflicted with the disease anencephaly.

Red Giants

In 1911, miners were digging out layers of guano from a cave located about 22 miles southwest of Lovelock, Nevada when they happened upon the mummified remains of an individual who must have stood 61/2 feet tall when alive.

A tall Native American, perhaps? Probably not, since the mummy was still crowned with "distinctly red" hair. Amazingly, the ancient legends of the local Paiute Indians described a race of red-haired giants - called Si-te-cahs - who were the enemies of many Indian tribes of the region.

The Starchild Skull

Lloyd Pye, author of Everything You Know Is Wrong, has taken it upon himself to discover the identity of an unusual skull he has dubbed "The Starchild Skull." The skull, which was found in a mine shaft near Chihuahua, Mexico around 1930, is unusually wide at the back and exhibits larger than normal eye sockets.

Although he says the origin of the skull is uncertain, Pye speculates on whether or not it could be of alien origin - or at least belonging to a human-alien hybrid.

While some contend that the skull was merely that of a deformed human child, Pye wanted definitive proof and so, in late 1999, subjected the skull to DNA testing. The results of the test indicated that the skull was from a human being, but Pye points out that the lab could not extract sufficient strands of DNA to make a definitive conclusion, and therefore the question still remains open.

Fatheads

Robert Connolly has photographed a similar, more complete skulls. (See photos.) In most respects it appears to be that of a human, except that it has an extraordinarily large cranium and eye sockets.

The eye sockets are about 15 percent larger than a modern human's. The age and date of the skull are unknown. Similar skulls appear in photos by Karen Scheidt of remains found in a Mexican cave. Could they all be genetic mutations, some unknown species of creature or something not of this world?

The Horn projections extended two inches above the eye-brows, and the skeletons were seven feet tall, but other than that were anatomically normal.

The general opinion seems to be that they are human but are not the result of medical deformation and are too anomalous to be the result of "binding" techniques. In addition, some of the skulls have brain vault capacities significantly in excess of modern man.

This is a very unusual pumpkin shaped skull.

These anomalous skulls were located by Mr. Connolly in various South American museums. The "cone shaped head" type is very unusual because of the cranial shape.

Here we have a specimens, which exclude the possibility of random or artificial deformation. These cone-shaped types of skull are not found amongst the usual skull-binding samples.