Among the many curious artefacts discovered at Star Carr none are more famous than the enigmatic ‘Antler Headdresses’. As part of the work conducted by the University of York Archaeology department into understanding these incredible artefacts, assemblage of material culture, experimental were designed and carried out at the YEAR Centre.

​The headdresses have historically been argued to be either part of a hunting disguise or ritual paraphernalia, perhaps linked to shamanic practices . Experiments led by Dr Aimée Little revealed that the process of producing an antler frontlet was labour intensive, involving the use of tools to remove and process the skin, fire to process the bone, and specialised robust stone tools to create perforations in the skull through pecking. The experimental results were used to inform new analysis of the archaeological antler frontlets, studied using high-resolution 3D scans to prevent any damage to what are highly fragile artefacts. In either case the amount of work that was put into preparing them indicates they were of high value and were deposited into the lake after use.