A Brief History of Trepanation, One of the World’s Oldest Surgeries
In the 1860s , a U.S. newsprint editor , author , and amateurarchaeologistnamedE.G. Squiertraveled to Cuzco , Peru . He visited the home of a wealthy char who gather up antiquities to watch an ancient skull , discover in an Inca cemetery in the Valley of Yuca and date to pre - Columbian times . Notably , it had a large , orthogonal yap at its top . Squier — a well - educated polymath whose areas of expertness also included Latin American culture — was immediately intrigued ....