Page 23 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - Febrary/March 2020 Edition

The Skull of Doom 23

The Mitchell-Hedges

crystal skull: Fact,

fiction, and the

creation of myth

By Jane MacLaren Walsh
Archaeological Institute of America

Crystal skulls have long had a fringe following,
and the most famous of them is one named for
the explorer-author Frederick A. Mitchell-
Hedges (see "Legend of the Crystal Skulls").
Mitchell-Hedges claimed to have found the skull
somewhere in Central America in the 1930s, but
his adopted daughter Anna later said she found it
under a fallen altar or inside a pyramid at the
Maya site of Lubaantún in British Honduras
(now Belize) some time in the 1920s. Neither of
their contradictory accounts is true. In fact, like
all the other crystal skulls thus far examined, it
is a modern creation, despite its nearly mythical
place in the minds of devotees.
I have had two opportunities to examine
the Mitchell-Hedges skull closely and to take
silicone molds of carved and polished elements
of it, which I have analyzed under high-power
light and scanning-electron microscopes. I have
also evaluated the documentary evidence,
newspaper stories about Mitchell-Hedges, his
memoirs Land of Wonder and Fear (1931) and
Danger My Ally (1954), and a file of letters and
documents that Anna Mitchell-Hedges sent to
Frederick Dockstader, the director of the
Museum of the American Indian in New York
City, which I recently found.
The microscopic evidence presented
here indicates that the skull is not a Maya
artifact but was carved with high-speed, modern,
diamond-coated lapidary tools. The historical
record shows it first appeared in London in 1933
and was purchased a decade later by Mitchell-
Hedges, who claimed the crystal skull was an
authentic pre-Columbian artifact. The newly first appeared in 1933, was also created within Lubanntun. Eventually, I believe that Anna
found archival evidence suggests Anna was later short time of its debut. attempted to legitimize this object through its
involved in the evolution of tall tales about the Frederick A. Mitchell-Hedges began an exhibition in a respected museum—the Museum
skull's origins, providing a fascinating look at association with a California art dealer named of the American Indian.
the creation of a popular mythology in service of Frank Dorland in the 1950s to promote and sell The correspondence between Frederick
a profitable business venture. an icon he called the Black Virgin of Kazan, Dockstader, director of the Museum of the
which later turned out to be a copy. Anna American Indian, and Anna Mitchell-Hedges
Mitchell-Hedges continued this relationship clearly demonstrates how the process of
Conclusion
after her father died in 1959, ultimately agreeing legitimizing objects with potential mass appeal
to Dorland's proposal to "launch a program but dubious authenticity and provenience works.
Analysis of the Mitchell-Hedges crystal skull
about the [crystal] Skull and get your price" In their letters, each seemed to flatter the other to
using SEM leaves little doubt that this object
(11/25/1963). A number of wildly speculative achieve their own separate, though similar, ends:
was carved and polished using modern, high-
publications resulted from this promotion. One, to increase visitation to the museum and to
speed, diamond-coated, rotary, cutting and
Phrenology (1970), suggested the skull had enhance the status of the crystal skull.
polishing tools of minute dimensions. This
belonged to the Knights Templar and was taken Despite the Museum of the American
technology is certainly not pre-Columbian. I
to British Honduras by Mitchell-Hedges. Indian director's long-held suspicions about the
believe it is decidedly 20th century. The
Another, Ambrose Bierce, F.A. Mitchell-Hedges skull, not to mention the warnings from well-
similarities between the Mitchell-Hedges skull
and the Crystal Skull (1973), claimed that meaning colleagues, the Mitchell-Hedges skull
and the British Museum skull suggest that the
Bierce, a journalist who disappeared in Mexico was, in fact, exhibited in New York for an
former is an improved copy of the latter. The
in 1913, and Mitchell-Hedges had stolen the extended run. That exhibition endowed the skull
recently published SEM study of the British
skull when they were both fighting alongside with a legitimacy that it had not had previously.
Museum skull additionally suggests it was
Pancho Villa. Later, Dorland hired the novelist
probably carved within a decade of the date it
Richard Garvin to write The Crystal Skull that
was first offered for sale in 1881 (Sax, Walsh, et
had Anna Mitchell-Hedges herself discovering (Continued on Page 24)
al. 2008: p. 2759). It is not unreasonable to
the skull inside of a Maya pyramid at
conclude that the Mitchell-Hedges skull, which