A 4,000-year-old child skull found on Norway’s west coast is giving fresh details about early farming life. Archaeologists recovered the remains inside Skipshelleren, a large rock shelter in Vaksdal.
The work belongs to the INDICAVE project. Teams from the University of Bergen and the University of Tromsø study caves and rock shelters along the coast. Their goal is to learn who lived in these places and how they used them.
Skipshelleren sits under a wide rock overhang near a fjord. The shelter stays dry, even in heavy rain. This helped preserve bones and tools for thousands of years. People used the site for about 7,500 years, from early prehistory onward.
Earlier excavations took place in 1931. Researchers thought the site was fully cleared at the time. New work showed a different picture. A hidden area lay under old digging layers and had never been studied.
Inside these untouched layers, archaeologists found long records of human life. Thousands of animal bones came out of the soil. Fish, birds, and mammals all appear in the mix. Tools made from stone and bone also turned up. Pottery fragments and fishhooks add more detail. Some layers go back about 7,000 years.
A key find was a child burial from 4,000 years ago. The skull shows the child was between two and four years old at death.
This find links to a story from 1955. A local girl, Bjørg Dæmring Berge, first found parts of the same skeleton near the site. She returned during the new dig and pointed out the exact spot. More bones came from the same grave after her guidance.
Archaeologists now see Skipshelleren as both home and burial ground. People lived there and also buried their dead inside the shelter during the Stone Age.
About 40,000 animal bones have been collected from the site. Each one will be sorted by species. These remains help show food habits and daily life along the coast.
Scientists also gathered soil samples. These include plant remains, dating samples, and ancient DNA from the soil layers. Each sample helps build a timeline of how people used the shelter over time.
The child skeleton will go through DNA and isotope tests. Researchers aim to learn more about early farmers in Norway. The results could show diet, physical traits, and possible origins of these coastal groups.
Skipshelleren now stands as one of the richest prehistoric sites on Norway’s coast. It holds long records of human life, stretching across thousands of years of use.