LAUSR

1 Department of General Surgery, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China 2 Peking Union Medical College Hospital, No. 1 Shuai Fu Yuan Street, Beijing, China As an important archaeological site in China, the Sanxingdui ruins belonged to the ancient Shu Kingdom, an independent kingdom that existed 4800 years ago in what is now Sichuan Province. Among the thousands of artifacts unearthed there [1, 2], dozens of bronze masks with strange eyes are probably the oldest record of Graves’ disease. Epidemiological data indicate that iodine deficiency is a risk factor for Graves’ disease [3]. And Sichuan Province has suffered from iodine deficiency and a prevalence of hyperthyroidism since ancient times. The almond-shaped bulging eyes of bronze masks, which are thought to reflect the features of the ancient Shu people (Fig. 1), are consistent with the Graves’ ophthalmopathy. The Bonze Mask with Protruding Eyes, considered to represent the king of Shu, Can Cong (Fig. 2), has monstrous eyes whose shape is unprecedented in ancient China and other civilizations: the cylindrical eyeballs protrude vertically, measuring 13.5 cm in diameter and 16.5 cm in length. With high probability, Can Cong have had severe Graves’ disease? When shaping the mask, the ancient Shu people, lacking medical knowledge, artistically magnified his eyes to deify them with a strong sense of sacredness. Fig. 1 Bronze masks unearthed at Sanxingdui ruins, bronze mask with almond-shaped bulging eyes