9,000 yr old Caucasian mummy of Spirit Cave, Nevada

9,000 yr old Caucasian mummy of Spirit Cave, Nevada~

The Spirit Cave mummy is the oldest human mummy found in North America. It was discovered in 1940 in Spirit Cave, thirteen miles east of Fallon, Nevada, USA by the husband-and-wif e archaeological team of Sydney and Georgia Wheeler.

Upon entering Spirit Cave they discovered the remains of two people wrapped in tule matting. One set of remains, buried deeper than the other, had been partially mummified (the head and right shoulder). The Wheelers, with the assistance of local residents, recovered a total of sixty-seven artifacts from the cave.

In 1996 University of California, Riverside anthropologist R. Ervi Taylor examined seventeen of the Spirit Cave artifacts using mass spectrometry. The results indicated that the mummy was approximately 9,400 years old. Further study determined that the mummy exhibits Caucasoid characteristics resembling the Ainu (an Ethnic Japanese people).