"One could imagine that kids would use any piece of wood they found to play in the waves, just as kids and adults do today with their boards," Okumura said.
The study confirms earlier speculation about exostoses, which have been identified in ancient skeletal remains from Yugoslavia, the Canary Islands, Middle Europe, other parts of South America and even Imperial Rome.
Paleoanthropologist Georgio Manzi of La Sapienza University in Rome and colleagues studied the Roman skeletons, which dated from the first to the third centuries. The scientists established "close links between the occurrence of auditory exostoses and prolonged cold water exposure, generally due to the practice of aquatic sports, or to working activities involving water contact or diving."
In many of the Roman cases, it appeared that frequent thermal bathing led to the ear canal bone masses, since men would often warm up in saunas and hot baths before plunging in icy pools. Roman women, who usually skipped the freezing cold water routine, had far fewer exostoses.
Eggers thinks Eskimos warded off the problem because they often wore hoods, a fact that should be taken note of today by water sports fanatics.
She said, "Although the use of a hood or earplugs has not been proven to completely prevent the development of auditory exostoses, wearing this equipment can help individuals who have intense contact with water to avoid the development of this anomaly."
