Signs Of Trauma On Neolithic Skeleton Indicate Early Humans’ Lifestyle Far More Slapstick Than Previously Thought

AMMAN, JORDAN—In a discovery archaeologists claimed would radically alter our understanding of early humans’ ability to carry a teetering column of objects and then subsequently drop them all after stubbing a toe, a Neolithic skeleton unearthed Tuesday reportedly bears signs of trauma suggesting early humans had a lifestyle far more slapstick than previously imagined. “Our team at the Ain Ghazal dig site has located the remains of a very foolish man who died in approximately 8800 B.C.E., and whose cranial trauma leads us to believe that coeval Homo sapiens were bonked with 10 times as many blunt objects than we once thought,” said dig site supervisor Dr. Rajat Patel, noting that the 11,000-year-old body’s low-density, dysplastic hip bones paint a picture of ancient humans scrambling to pull up pants that haphazardly dropped around their ankles 10 to 15 times a day. “Additionally, the scores of injuries to this man’s tailbone indicate a history of near-constant pratfalls, presumably suffered after sliding on the peels of local fruits; while malformations in his pubis tell us he would often suffer sudden and surprising blows to the groin, most likely causing him to scream the early hominid equivalent of ‘Yowch.’ Perhaps most interesting are the signs of repeated simultaneous heat trauma and saltwater damage to the upper cranium, which lead us to believe that this man made a habit of accidentally setting himself on fire and then sprinting into the ocean to extinguish the flames in a sizzling burst of steam. Once there, judging by his crushed and abraded nasal bones, he was typically pinched on the nose by a tenacious crab that refused to let go.” Patel promised that further discoveries would be forthcoming once his team was able to examine the perfect fleeing man-shaped holes in the walls surrounding the excavation site.