Monterey – The mysterious male skeleton found on a Monterey job site last month is 4,080 years old, testing has revealed.
The age solidifies early assumptions he was Native American, significantly predating European contact.
The skeleton’s age did not surprise the local Ohlone Costanoan Esselen Nation.
“What can we say? These are our ancestors and we know they’ve been here for longer than the 4,000 years,” chairwoman Louise Miranda Ramirez said.
Members of the Esselen Nation were on hand to observe the skeleton’s removal from the Lighthouse Avenue site, where a three-story, mixed-use building is going up.
The Sheriff’s Office had already decided the skeleton was Native American based on abalone shells found around the gravesite.
Bone testing was conducted by Berkeley-based Pacific Legacy, which said there could be a 30-year plus or minus date to the 4,080 estimate.
This is not the first time an old skeleton was found locally.
In 2010, the remains of a 3,000-year old Native American woman were discovered by trenching work at Carmel Valley Ranch. Esselen Nation maintains its people were in the Monterey area going back at least 12,000 years.
The new site is between Reeside and Dickman avenues next to Carbone’s Bar.
Carmel Valley historian Philip Laverty said the location could have religious implications.
He said many coastal Native Americans believed the soul traveled west over the horizon after death.
“I imagine it has profound spiritual significance,” he said, “being on the edge of the land and water. It is a transition point.”
Even with buildings on Foam Street and Cannery Row, it is still possible to see the Monterey Bay today from where the skeleton was found.
“It’s beautiful,” Ramirez said. “Imagine that area with no houses, no Wharf, nothing there but nature, oak trees everywhere.”
She does not want to give out the name the tribe has given him, but said it roughly translates to “one with Earth.” It is a reference to the tight soil surrounding the skeleton.
The mixed-use building near the burial site is set to be completed in mid-2016, developer Carl Outzen said.
The 30,250-square-foot property was purchased by Outzen in 2013. It was the site of an original Monterey pueblo, was later populated by cannery workers and, during the Korean War, by language teachers.
For decades, eight white buildings stood on the site in extreme disrepair. When Outzen knocked them down, it revealed a nearly 90-year-old “Genuine ‘Bull’ Durham Tobacco” sign on the side of Carbone’s Bar.
The sign itself has already gotten plenty of attention, meaning the site could come under even more scrutiny now that it has been revealed a body was buried there for four millennia.
Ramirez said the tribe is open to burying the skeleton in a secret location off site.
She said the tribe has already ruled out DNA testing because of the cost and damage to remains — despite a long-running battle to get recognition from the federal government.
She said she did not think finding a 4,000-year-old skeleton would make a difference to the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Phillip Molnar can be reached at 726-4361.
