Archaeologists uncover an 'amazingly lifelike' half-human, half-walrus shaman mask in disappearing Alaskan village

As the southwest Alaskan village of Quinhagak threatens to erode away into the Bering Sea, teams of researchers are racing to save Yup'ik artifacts before they vanish without a trace. And their hard work has paid off — lead archaeologist Rick Knecht described to KYUK - Bethel the discovery of a half-human, half-walrus mask in near perfect condition.

"It's got amazingly lifelike contours with the cheek bones, and the nose, and the forehead, and so on," Knecht said. "Beautifully carved out of wood, and as you can see it's got two little conical tusks that represent that transformation into a walrus. And these are in fact made out of walrus ivory. It's got a little beard here, and half of it are human hairs and then on the other half are sea mammal hairs, maybe walrus whiskers."

Knecht believes the mask could have belonged to a Yup'ik shaman. Archaeologists have also discovered household items, such as bowls, as well as jewelry and weapons at the site. Like the mask, many of the items — some of which are 700 hundred years old — are well preserved because they were encased in permafrost.

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According to researchers, the Yup'ik people lived in the Quinhagak region until around 1640, when their structures were burned down by rival tribes and abandoned. In Yup'ik lore, the abandonment of the site corresponds with what is known as the "bow and arrow wars." Jeva Lange