A WALKER strolling along a beach made an amazing find when

he stumbled across the remains of a Bronze Age tribal chieftain

protruding from the ground.

The discovery of the middle-aged man's skeleton and cisk –

or burial casket – was made by amateur archaeologist Trevor

Renals on Constantine Island, on the North Cornwall coast.

He noticed that fragments of what appeared to be human bone

had become exposed owing to coastal erosion.

Experts were so excited by the find that they performed an

emergency week-long excavation of the site to extract it in a

race against coastal erosion and storms.

The Middle Bronze Age find is thought to be of an important

man, possibly a chieftain, and is very unusual because

cremation, not burial, was popular in the period and other

skeletons are not normally found so well-preserved.

Mr Renals said: "I was walking along the coast – it is a

particularly rich area for remains – and I was actually looking

for flint and there was one area that was particularly eroded

from pedestrian access.

"While searching one particular area I found a front tooth

and another piece of bone and I looked to see where it had come

from.

"I could see from the bit of flint sticking out of the

ground that it was actually a stone-lined cisk.

"When I realised it was actually a burial I got in contact

with the county archaeologist."

Mr Renals said he also identified the base of the spine,

pelvis and femur.

In a race against time and the elements experts from

Cornwall County Council Historic Environments Service and the

National Trust began an excavation of the site after it was

discovered.

The trust, which owns the land where the skeleton was found,

said Constantine Island was once part of the mainland.

A spokesman said: "It is rare because it is a skeleton –

they were cremated or the bones didn't survive.

"As soon as we found out we had to make arrangements for it

to be excavated because of the danger of it going into the sea.

We knew that storms were coming and we had to get it

removed."

It is believed that the man was from the Middle Bronze Age

of about 1380-1100BC and may have been an important member of

his community.

The spokesman said: "We think he was probably a middle-aged

male.

"We don't know how tall he would have been because the long

bones were fragmented. We know he had quite small teeth for a

man.

"Little is known about the man but he may have been of

importance to the small community that he would have come from

as it appears that special care was taken over his burial.

"To build a cisk and cover him with stones and possibly,

turf on top wouldn't have been done with everyone."

The cisk and remains are with Cornwall County Council's

historic environments service.

Mr Renals, 42, an ecologist working for the Environment

Agency, said he was excited to identify the site and said that

walkers on the coastal path had not noticed it – despite

sitting on and walking over the ancient casket.

"The cisk was right on a quite popular path and people had

been sitting on it and walking over it and not realised they

were inches away from an ancient skeleton," he said.

"I feel very privileged, more than anything. I didn't just

treat it like animal remains. I was very cautious to show him

respect."

Mr Renals, from Wadebridge, North Cornwall, said the man had

been buried in a crouching position typical of pagan

rituals.

"It's clearly a pagan burial because it is a north-south

alignment which is a pagan alignment

"And the body is looking out west towards the sea."

Mr Renals added that the site had been excavated just in

time as in winter storms would lash the tidal Constantine

Island, destroying the site.