Scot's Indiana Jones skull quest

Kevin Keane
Fife reporter
BBC Scotland news website

Indiana Jones chases the secrets of the skull in the Hollywood film

A Scot has spent 20 years trying to find the secrets of an ancient crystal skull, as depicted in a Hollywood film.

The latest Indiana Jones movie features the superhero searching for the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but Cris Winter from Fife has been searching longer.

According to mythology, the real-life Mitchell-Hedges skull, which the movie is loosely based on, is thought to hold secrets of a lost civilisation.

Cris has spent years globe trotting to unravel the cryptic mystery.

He first became interested in the skull after he had a dream about it and decided to conduct research.

Ancient skulls

The 64-year-old tracked it down to North America and has joined a growing group of people who believe it is one of 13 ancient skulls which, when put together, will create a hologram to uncover lost worlds.

The Mitchell-Hedges skull, the only one known to be in existence, can be traced back to 1943 when it was purchased at an auction in London for £400 by the man whose name it now bears.

Experts have been unable to date it but some believe it is 3,500 years old. Others have dismissed it as a fake.

You can not understand this through a rational approach Cris Winter

Cris said he became friends with the former owner of the skull, Mitchell-Hedges' adopted daughter Anna.

He had chanced his luck at her house, in Canada, where he was welcomed inside to see the skull.

"I was just amazed at the artistic beauty of it. The immediate thing you think when you see it is 'my god' and it puts an enormous question mark when you look at it. Where did it come from?

"If nobody's got an answer, then where did it come from and that's the quest it sets you up on."

Cris believes it represents a mythology which could one day lead to a lost world.

"You can not understand this through a rational approach. You have to discard the rational mind."

Since first encountering the skull in 1989, Cris said he has progressed very little in understanding its meaning.

He has studied text written by Mitchell-Hedges and believes there are clues about where it may have come from.

Interest in its meaning may now increase to the levels witnessed by the Da Vinci Code mystery depicted in the Dan Brown novel.

Cris - a former businessman - has been involved in making a documentary film about the secrets of the skull which is due to be released later this year.