Ancient South American origins, rumored supernatural powers, only a handful in existence – it’s easy to see why crystal skulls would be archaeological catnip for Indiana Jones.
But even the most ardent “Raiders” fan would have to admit that as far as badass titles go, “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. It sounds more like an amusement park ride (which it actually is, in Tokyo) than the latest installment in one of the most beloved film series ever.
So let’s forget the title and focus on the object of Indy’s slightly more geriatric quest. Turns out crystal skulls do have a pretty compelling background story – maybe not as cool as the Ark of the Covenant, but definitely cooler than the Sankara Stones in “Temple of Doom.”
Producer George Lucas has had crystal skulls on the brain for years now: “We did ‘The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles,’ and in the process of that, one of the scripts we were working on was about a crystal skull,” he has said. “I became fascinated with it.”
The archeological objects in question are replicas of human skulls carved from a single, clear quartz crystal. They are painstakingly close to the real thing, and polished to a perfect smoothness. What gets archaeologists’ pulses racing, though, is that they’re carved against the grain, which nearly always shatters crystal. Only 13 have been found thus far, most in Central and South America.
The most famous, known as the Mitchell-Hedges skull, was discovered in 1926 under disputed circumstances. The explorer who found it claimed to have unearthed the skull in the ruins of a temple in Belize – and said she was subsequently told by Mayan locals that it was used for nefarious purposes, leading to its nickname, “The Skull of Doom.”
Other skulls were eventually found – and accused of being art market forgeries. At least one skull, in the British Museum, has been proven a fake. Marks on the skull didn’t match hand carving tools used by the Aztecs.
A recent article in Archaeology magazine went further, claiming that “not a single crystal skull in a museum collection comes from a documented excavation, and they have little stylistic or technical relationship with any genuine pre-Columbian depictions of skulls.”
Still, paranormal speculators reliably hold fast to the theory that the skulls are evidence of otherworldly technology. “These things are big crystals, and people started thinking of them as these super- computers of past civilizations,” Harvard archaeology professor Marc Zender recently told MTV. “Maybe this skull has stored all of the lost knowledge of the Mayans or Atlantians, or ET [extra- terrestrials].”
Better still, some say the skulls, when united, would unleash some heretofore unknown power (kinda like those “Temple of Doom” stones, actually).
In the most outlandish theory, it’s been proposed that the 13 skulls were clues left by a “Hollow Earth society,” which has since relocated to new digs in the earth’s core.
Putting aside the question of whether the skulls were consistent with their attributed cultures, it’s entirely possible that they were made by plain old human beings.
David Carballo, visiting assistant professor in Anthropology at the University of West Georgia, says ancient cultures definitely could have made the skulls. “Meso-americans routinely polished statues and other artifacts out of jade, which is just as hard,” he says. “Working those materials takes a lot of time, but all you need is a sand slurry and a lot of patience.”
But Carballo won’t be complaining if the new Indy film takes liberties with the facts. In fact, he’s sort of expecting it.
“The opening sequence of ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ combines things from different Mesoamerican, Andean and Amazonian groups, and I would guess that the new one will be more of the same.
“Which I personally am fine with,” he adds. “Indy was my hero as a kid.”