A truly bovine find in the desert.
"(...I'm just a pile of bleached bones. I can't talk.)"
— A pile of bleached bones, EarthBound (1994)
Whenever a show features or references a desert, savannah or other barren land, odds are good that a bovine cranium will be involved to set the mood. As is often the case, the rest of the skeleton goes unseen (though a most likely explanation is that scavengers carried off the bones). May overlap with Foreboding Carcass if bad things happen in the desert.
Often accompanied by cacti. Thirsty Desert is a companion trope.
Compare sister tropes Ribcage Ridge and Sinister Deer Skull.
Examples:
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Anime and Manga
- Doraemon
- Doraemon: Nobita's Dorabian Nights have Doraemon and friends stranded in the Arabian Desert and trying to find their way out. When Suneo, Gian and Nobita complains it's pointless to go on, Doraemon tells them they can choose to keep walking or end up like "that" - "that" being a bovine skeleton nearby Doraemon is pointing at. Cue Nobita and gang quickly running.
- A bovine skull with bones is literally the first thing that appears in the manga of Doraemon: Nobita and the Winged Braves, which is later revealed to be a documentary watched by Nobita and friends at Suneo's house.
- The opening scene of GUN×SWORD has Van looking down at an animal skull in the desert and questioning why the creature isn't still alive for him to eat.
Art
- Shows up in many Georgia O'Keefe paintings.
- Arthur Rothstein's photo series documenting the dust bowl in South Dakota included several of these. It was a scandal at the time because it was pretty obviously the same skull every time (the series was part of a government program documenting the drought). According to the photographer he was just moving a skull he found around the same small area to capture the shadows differently.
Comic Books
- Wonder Woman (1987): The desert beyond the edges of the Sangtee Empire slave mining operation on "Hope's End" is littered with skulls and skeletons making attempts to escape out into the desert a less appealing option that it otherwise might be. There are also a few within the mining camp, but not many since the deceased are fed to the scavenger worms.
- Tintin: In "The Crab With the Golden Claws", Tintin and Haddock realize they're lost in the middle of the Sahara Desert when Snowy finds a bone... that came from the skeleton of a camel, just to drive home how dire their situation is.
Fan Works
- Vow of Nudity: In the story Showdown at Surly Gulch, the illustration of Haara preparing to jump onto a speeding train has a cow skull lying in the sand by the train tracks.
Films — Animation
- The owl mariachi band from Rango stood on one of these while singing about Rango's journey.
- An American Tail: Fievel Goes West: Tiger runs into a buffalo skeleton that seems to come to life when he's not looking. Turns out it's being manipulated by native mice, who then capture Tiger.
- The Lion King: As Simba returns to the Pridelands, he finds it riddled with skeletons (wildebeest, elephant, topi, gazelle, you name it) to show how Scar's rule has ruined the land. At the end, as Simba returns to power, there's a brief shot of a skull being washed away by the rain, to symbolize the end of the old regime.
- Cars 1 features a variation of this: since all animals in their world are also vehicles, in the desert surrounding Radiator Springs, there appear to be rusted-up car parts lying among the rocks and cacti.
- Fantasia - the 'Rite of Spring' segment shows the last of the dinosaurs shuffling into the desert dust - after which the camera pans to and closes in on the skull of the mighty T-Rex.
- Predator: Killer of Killers. The Yautja gladiatorial arena, located on a jagged desert planet, has the colossal skull of an even more colossal dead alien animal, on which the Predator Warlord stands to watch his Gladiator Games.
- The Super Mario Galaxy Movie: A scene that takes place in the desert begins with a Dry Bones skull that a Mini Goomba comes across. The Dry Bones skull attempts to eat the Goomba, who comes out the other side of the head unharmed before a Dry Bones arm comes out of the sand and grabs it.
Films — Live Action
- Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. A human skull is shown half-buried in the Fury Road, with flies buzzing on it and a lizard feeding on them. Suddenly the whole lot is crushed as the biker horde of Dementus roars past on the way to the Citadel. It's an unsubtle hint at the violence that's about to ensure.
- The Kaiser of California: John Sutter sees a horse skeleton as he walks across the desert, letting him know just how dangerous the Thirsty Desert is. Sure enough, soon after he has to shoot his own horse when it collapses.
- The New Land: Robert and Arvid get a vivid illustration of just how deep they're in trouble in the Thirsty Desert when they come across the bones of a would-be miner.
- The Plow That Broke the Plains, a documentary short about how the Great Plains became the Dust Bowl, includes a shot of a bleached, broken cow skull lying on cracked and dried-out land.
- On Yuatja Prime in Predator: Badlands, a large skeleton and skull of a deceased creature lays in the sand next to a cave system where Dek and Kwei spar.
- The Winning of Barbara Worth: In fact it's an entire dessicated cow skeleton that Worth sees, underlining the aridity of this part of the desert.
- A New Hope: On Tatooine, C-3PO passes by a skull of Krayt Dragon. The prop is actually still there out in the Tunisian Sahara, and is often buried by the sand and rediscovered.
- 1946 documentary short Facing Your Danger shows the river rafters on the Colorado finding what appears to be a human skeleton.
Live Action Television
- Fallout (2024): The last scene of the last episode of the first season shows the skull of a Deathclaw, one of the more iconic creatures of the Wasteland.
- Our Miss Brooks: The skull of an extinct buffalo was found in "Kritch Cave" (in the episode of the same name). Kritch Cave is located in Kritch Canyon, the isolated, tract of barren land behind Madison High School. Kritch Cave is only accessible through the rear of the Madison High School lands; its made inaccessible to the rest of the world by Kritch Mountain (in actuality, a tall hill).
- Readalong: In episode 3, in the image of "lots of room", which is a desert, there's a horned skull half-buried in the sand.
- Wagon Train: A desert skull appears in the illustrated opening and closing credits shown seasons one through five.
Literature
- In the Australian children's novel Midnite: The Story of a Wild Colonial Boy by Randolph Stow, the title character is Crossing the Desert with a German explorer. They come across a great salt lake surrounded by bones. The German says it's "the end of the Outback, where come poets and explorers to die." He and his camels then lay down among the bones and expire. That night, Midnite is rather creeped out when a wind starts blowing through the skulls and bones making them all sprout poetry.
- One of the oldest pop-cultural examples comes from A Study in Scarlet. Yes, that A Study In Scarlet, which lends almost half its pagespace to a Cowboy Episode:
"Looking down from the Sierra Blanco, one sees a pathway traced out across the desert, which winds away and is lost in the extreme distance... Here and there there are scattered white objects which glisten in the sun, and stand out against the dull deposit of alkali. Approach, and examine them! They are bones: some large and coarse, others smaller and more delicate. The former have belonged to oxen, and the latter to men. For fifteen hundred miles one may trace this ghastly caravan route by these scattered remains of those who had fallen by the wayside."
Music
- Voltaire referenced this in "Fear and Anguish"
From over the range that is where we found
Scattered on the ground, fifty heads of steer.
But what's real queer;
We searched all around
No other part was found!
Scattered on the ground, fifty heads of steer.
But what's real queer;
We searched all around
No other part was found!
Newspaper Comics
- Garfield: A three comic mini-arc that ran from 25 to 27 May 1987 had Jon bring home one of these, which Garfield then put on Odie, while Jon was talking to his mother on the phone about it.
- In the comic strip Beyond The Black Stump, two recurring characters are a pair of skulls out in the desert somewhere who pass the time having odd conversations.
- The Far Side: One uncaptioned cartoon shows a pair of oxen pulling a covered wagon across the desert, turning their heads as they pass a bovine skull.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons has the gambado, a monster originally from the Fiend Folio, that disguises itself as this trope. When revealed, they appear as one-legged humanoids with sharp claws and either an animal or human skull for a head.
Toys, Games, Collectibles
- The Matchbox/Revell kit of the WW2 German Panzer III tank
◊ comes with a display base to mount the completed tank kit; it depicts a North African desert sand-dune, with the tank posed as breasting the crest of the sand. Just to emphasise the point this is an Afrika Korps panzer, there is a bleached animal skull to set artistically into the modelled sand.
Video Games
- In Animal Crossing, this shows up as a furniture item in the "American West/frontier" set. Sometimes animals who are cows have them in their homes...
- Blood West contains plenty of bovine skulls on poles all over the game, and they're capable of speaking since they're inhabited by Native American spirits. The first NPC you spoke to in the first level is in fact one such skull.
- The Game Over screen of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night features a wasteland with what appears to be the skeleton of a dragon, possibly as a glimpse of a world where Dracula is allowed to roam free.
- Dyna Gear have gigantic dinosaur skulls in the desert levels, which can be destroyed to reveal coins or bonuses.
- In EarthBound (1994), you can actually have a conversation with a cattle skeleton in the Dusty Dunes Desert. It, of course, claims otherwise.
- Appears multiple times throughout the Fallout series, natch. It's not always a cow skull, though...
- God of War: The Fate Of The Titans cinematic, which is unlocked by beating the game, contains a Sequel Hook that was never followed up on (unlike the other two unlockable cinematics, which were eventually reworked into God of War: Ghost of Sparta) and shows the giant skeleton of the Titan Cronus being discovered in modern day by military forces somewhere in the Middle East, the ruins of Pandora's Temple still attached to its back.
- The Western-themed arcade game, Heated Barrel, have shootouts in the desert against Red Indians, where the level will have assorted cattle skulls and bones decorating the area.
- StarCraft I had all sorts of bones and skulls in the randomly generated desert terrain tiles.
- Cave Story's Sand Zone is full of bones... including animated ones.
- The standard Clonk desert scenarios contain, along with cacti, animal skulls as decoration.
- Eets uses this as decoration for desert-themed levels.
- These can be found in the desert levels of the Game Boy Advance Fire Emblem games. Rare items can be dug up in the nearby sands.
- Hidden Folks: Skulls and bones are a common decoration in the Desert level.
- There's a giant wraid skull on Tatooine in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Click it at your own risk - it summons a World Boss.
- There's plenty of skeletal remains for you to explore in the Western Desert from Avalon Code. In a particular area, you find what appears to be the skeleton of a dragon, as well as the skeleton of the knight who failed to slay said dragon and the skeleton of the princess devoured by said dragon.
- In Mass Effect 1, you can find a skull of an unknown creature on a desert planet Maji.
- Monster Hunter: If you find the massive skull of a Monoblos or Diablos in the desert, beware! A Daimyo Hermitaur may be using it for a shell. In an ecology cutscene shown in Monster Hunter 2 (dos), we see a group of Felyne merchants learn this the hard way.
- The Legend of Zelda:
- The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons: You can find a human skull (a former pirate) in the desert who you need to carry around over your head until he spots the particular quicksand pit you need to progress. He does so by suddenly chattering his teeth.
- A few also turn up in the Gerudo desert in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
- Throughout the Super Mario Bros. series, deserts are a common place to find Dry Bones. Exaggerated in Mario Kart 8 with Bone-Dry Dunes, which contain a Ribcage Ridge, a gigantic Dry Bowser skull, skeletal Piranha Plants, and Dry Bones.
- In Nuclear Throne, cattle skulls spawn around the Desert. Being set after the apocalypse, they're mutant cattle - four eyes sockets instead of two.
- Oriental Legend have the stage in the desert outside the Mount of Flames, with gigantic skulls which you can smash for objects and points.
- The Dusty Valley in Iggle Pop! is an arid desert which is littered with skulls.
- Wild West Jellyfish Fields in SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake has desert and valley areas littered with cowbones, who generally spout out pseudo-spiritual advice when you interact with them.
Web Animation
- In the Happy Tree Friends episode "Take a Hike", a bovine skull can be seen while the scout troop treks through the desert.
Webcomics
- Ed from CoyoteVille is a desert skull who can converse and interact with the rest of the cast.
- Poison Ivy Gulch: Ace finds one and even lampshades it.
Web Original
- One is seen, alongside the inevitable cacti, in the opening illustration of the The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids short story The Labors of Juliet, where Juliet is exiled in a desert.
- In Pioneer Trail (formerly FrontierVille), these keep popping up on disused parts of your homestead.
Western Animation
- Adventure Time has these, except some of them seem to be skulls of aquatic animals.
- At the top of the Arthur episode "Feeling Flush," there's an Imagine Spot where the kids are walking through the desert. The very first shot we see is of a skull.
- Bugs Bunny:
- Bugs wears one in the Looney Tunes short "The Wacky Wabbit".
- In another Looney Tunes cartoon, Bugs Bunny Gets the Boid, Bugs falls into a hole next to some cow bones, and he briefly thinks the bones are his. Later, he tricks Killer the Buzzard into thinking the same.
- Parodied in the BoJack Horseman episode "The Old Sugarman Place". As Bojack drives through a desert, we see a cow skull with the rest of the skeleton still attached...and it has a wristwatch on its arm, sunglasses in its palm, and the remnants of clothing on its body.
- Flowers and Trees has a rare non-desert example. The evil tree lives in a dead patch of the forest which has the skull of a cow (or some similar animal) on the ground.
- The season 3 finale of King of the Hill sees Peggy's parachute fail to deploy while skydiving, causing her to crash-land in a barren mud plain. As Hank and other first responders desperately comb the mud for Peggy, Luanne breaks down sobbing when she finds a sun-bleached cow skull◊, which she assumes is all that remains of her aunt.
- In the My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic episode "Over a Barrel" a generic bovine skull can be seen during a brief shot of a desert around Appleloosa, even though not only are the bovines established to be sentient in this series, but the very episode in question revolves around a native tribe of buffaloes who inhabit these lands.
- Mr. Bogus comes across one of these while lost in the desert in the first act of the episode "Good Sport Bogus".
- In the Phineas and Ferb episode "Road to Danville", Dr. Doofenshmirtz asks this right out: "Why do we always see cow skulls in the desert? And why do you only see the skull? Did the body die somewhere else? It makes no sense."
- On Rocko's Modern Life, after becoming frustrated with his anthropomorphic food processor (and failing to get rid of it), the food processor attacks Spunky. Rocko decides that this is the last straw, and drives the food processor out into the desert and abandons it there. The food processor walks past a cow skull. It also leaves some bones behind after it eats a vulture.
- Sidekick: More than once, a bull skull shows up in the deserts the characters go to, the earliest example being in "A Monster Headache" with the desert Trevor and Vana go to to find a mushroom to cure Pamplemoose.
- SpongeBob SquarePants's ancestor SpongeBuck envisions two cow skulls talking to him in the episode "Pest of the West" when he's banished to the desert. Don't even try to question cow skulls appearing in a desert under the sea.
- In the We Bare Bears episode "The Road", a young Ice Bear is seen wearing one of these as a hat after he and his brothers get lost in the desert.
Other
- Check out any zoo's exhibits of desert reptiles or arachnids. Odds are very good that at least one hollow ceramic Desert Skull will be on display, as the den for a lizard, snake, scorpion, or tarantula.
- In US currency, the reverse side of the 2007 Montana state quarter dollar coin shows the skull of a bison.