Bulgarian archaeologists claim to have unearthed evidence that brain surgery was carried out more than 4,000 years ago. Georgi Nehrizov, heading a team digging near the city of Svilengrad, said a skull belonging to a man who lived in Thracian times had been found with a hole in it that had been carved out with surgical precision. He said: "The skull dates back to 2500-1800 BCE and the hole had clearly been made for medical reasons. It is the first such discovery from Thracian times."
     The Thracians were a nation made up of numerous tribes that developed from a mixture of invading Indo-European and indigenous peoples in the Balkans over the centuries, starting from the Early Bronze Age.

Source: Ananova (9 October 2006)