The skull of Luzia, a woman who lived over 11,000 years ago, was displayed in Brazil’s National Museum along with 20 million other artifacts that may all have perished.

FlickrThe 11,500 - year - former skull is of the oldest human remains found in the Americas .

A devastating blast at the   National Museum in Rio de Janeiro , Brazil is likely to have leave in thedestruction of thousands of priceless historical artifact . One of the most precious pieces is the skull of Luzia , the old human remain ever discovered in the Americas .

The 200 - year - old institution was institute in 1818 by King João VI of Portugal and make a motion to its current location in 1892 . The three - storey , 10,000 - square - cadence castle - turn - museum was once the abidance of King João VI as well as both of Brazil ’s emperor .

Skull of Luzia

FlickrThe 11,500-year-old skull is of the oldest human remains found in the Americas.

The National Museum ’s aggregation include approximately 20 million artifacts of natural chronicle , artistic creation , and archeology . functionary fear that up to90 percent of the collectioncould have been destroyed .

fantastically sorry telecasting from inside Brazil ’s gutted National Museum — only the meteorites withstood the firehttps://t.co/6BoTJqanSd

— Matthew Champion ( @matthewchampion)September 4 , 2018

National Museum of Brazil

Buda Mendes/Getty ImagesAerial view of the damage to the National Museum of Brazil after the fire in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Among those artifacts were a number of Egyptian mummies , the largest meteorite ever observe in Brazil , and irreplaceable artworks — but few are as unique as the skull of Luzia .

Brazil ’s culture curate , Sérgio Leitão , toldEstado de S Paulonewspaper that the blaze was most belike do by a malfunctioning electrical circuit .

Luiz Fernando Dias Duarte , the museum ’s deputy theatre director , explained that museum stave was all too aware that there were firing hazard present in the museum and pass away so far as to disconnect everything upon close to prevent a potential fire .

Rio de Janeiro’s National Museum

Carl de Souza / AFPView of the entrance of Rio de Janeiro’s National Museum on Sept. 3, 2018, a day after a massive fire ripped through the building.

Unfortunately , the museum staff ’s efforts were not enough to spare the collections and now the world has lost an significant piece of account . Museum staff and contestant fence that the regime ’s nonperformance of the museum is to charge for the wipeout of this very important collection .

“ It ’s a crime that the museum was allowed to get to this shape , ” said dissenter Laura Albuquerque . “ What materialize is n’t just too bad , it ’s withering and politicians are responsible for it . ”

Buda Mendes / Getty ImagesAerial view of the damage to the National Museum of Brazil after the fervidness in Rio de Janeiro , Brazil .

According toThe Guardian , the museum ’s budget had fallen from about $ 130,000 in 2013 to around $ 84,000 in 2017 . severally , the museum had actually secured virtually $ 5 million that was supposed to go toward a complete restoration of the innovation but was never put to use . Some ponder that this failure to rebuild help the fire and the subsequent loss of artifacts .

Those who blame the governance the fire call that political leader chose to focus their outgo on the sports stadium that were built for the 2016 Summer Olympics and the 2014 FIFA World Cup instead of on the National Museum . Because of this , the museum deteriorated .

“ The money spent on each one of those sports stadium , a poop of that would have been enough to make this museum dependable and glorious , ” say Duarte .

Carl de Souza / AFPView of the entree of Rio de Janeiro ’s National Museum on Sept. 3 , 2018 , a day after a massive fire rip through the building .

Although Brazil ’s President Michel Temer has annunciate that the museum will be rebuilt , the unreplaceable contents of the 200 - year - old collection will certainly leave a massive void for the donnish community .

Next , look into out the21 weirdest museums around the human beings . Then , learn this storey about theoldest human fossil to be discovered outside of Africa .