Around 1,400 years ago, a man in northern Italy lost his right hand in a brutal injury. Yet instead of dying from the wound or simply living without the limb, he found an unusual solution: he attached a knife to his arm and used it as a makeshift prosthetic. The extraordinary discovery comes from the Longobard necropolis at Povegliano Veronese in Veneto, where more than 160 graves were excavated. One skeleton, identified as T US 380, stood out from the rest.
Researchers believe the man was older and lived sometime between the 6th and 8th centuries. His remains suggest that the amputation healed successfully and, remarkably, that he survived for a considerable period afterwards.
