If you’re thinking that Cheddar Man is actually a guy made of cheese, then NO! Cheddar Man is actually a human male fossil found in Gough’s Cave in Cheddar Gorge (Somerset, England) thus the name.
Cheddar Man was found in 1903, when workmen were digging a drainage trench. They uncovered the remains of a young man, sealed under a stalagmite (a type of rock formation). Small at about 5ft 5 in, Cheddar would have weighed around 10 stone. The young man died in his early 20s. The cause hasn’t been determined yet. At almost 10,000 years old, it is unclear whether he died in the cave or was brought there by fellow tribesmen to be buried.
What made him so popular and intriguing though? Genetic analysis suggests he had blue eyes, and his skin was probably darker. About 10% of the genome of many white British people alive today comes from Cheddar man’s dark-skinned population. He was no anomaly, no lost, tanned tourist to the British Isles. Instead, he was of a group known as the western hunter-gatherers. They migrated into Europe at the end of the last ice age. The DNA of the others have been analysed too, and these Europeans too had the same dark skin.
Cheddar’s reconstruction, back in 1998, portrayed a light-skinned, brown-eyed ancestor, with straight, brown hair… That model was created without any genetic data. Ultimately, all humans came from Africa, so nobody’s original ancestors were white! However, those who came to Europe during that period were thought to be Europe-adapted. This means a skin colour appropriate to local levels of ultra-violet radiation.
The new Cheddar man sculpture saw the days few days ago thanks to artists Alfons and Adrie Kennis. They modelled a face from deep history, unusual in its expression of an intelligence, sensibility and sentiment. The last sculpture was made based on scientific information rather than assumptions and imagination.
Why the dark skin though? The populations residing in Europe developed lighter-skinned over time since pale skin take in more sunlight, as per Scientists. Required to produce enough vitamin D. Recent results suggest pale skin may have arisen later. Perhaps when the arrival of farming meant people were obtaining fewer vitamin D through dietary sources like oily fish.
Recall the hunters from animated movie ice age? Cheddar Man was perhaps like them, living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. He could have even made sharp blades from flints for butchering animals, carving bows and arrows and using antlers to whittle harpoons for spear fishing!
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