The 13,900-Year-Old Mastodon Rib Found With A Bone Point Still Inside — And The CT Scan That Put Hunters Before Clovis
The mastodon continued, alive or newly dead, with fragments of the broken tip locked inside its rib.
Eventually the mastodon died.
Its body began to decompose.
The soft tissue disappeared within years.
Other scavengers — the large predators and carrion-eaters of the late Pleistocene — may have disturbed the carcass, scattering some bones, leaving others in place.
The skeleton gradually became embedded in the accumulating sediment of the ancient lake or pond.
Groundwater moved through the sediment, replacing the minerals in the bone with minerals from the surrounding sediment, gradually mineralizing the bone while preserving its original structure.
The water rose and fell with the seasons.
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