Hereditary or Head-Binding? Archaeologist Seeks Answers on the Strange Achavanich Beaker Burial

In 1987, the remains of an 18-22-year-old woman, now dubbed Ava, were discovered at Achavanich in Caithness in the north of Scotland. The site was excavated by the Highland Regional Council Archaeology Unit, and the burial was later dated to the Middle Bronze Age. Although the discovery is interesting, and one aspect of it has been hotly debated by researchers, it was soon forgotten by most people. Now, an archaeologist is working to change that.

Archaeologist Maya Hoole hopes to renew public interest in the burial from about 3,700 years ago. As she told the BBC, “Like many others, I'm sure, I find skeletal remains completely mesmerising.”

On Hoole’s website, the Achavanich Beaker Burial Project, she explains her goal further: “I had one objective when I started this project: to change our understanding of this site and, over the last year, have been trying to make this happen.” Hoole believes that a renewed interest and modern technology could make this happen, revealing much more about the secrets of Ava’s life and death.

Many of the records about the excavation and analysis of the Achavanich Beaker burial have been lost, or perhaps they never existed. However, as Hoole shows, there was an extensive photographic survey of the excavation – these images provide vital information to modern researchers interested in the burial.