full title: "An amazing grave: Archaeologists say skeleton of woman is latest known early medieval burial found in Wales".
CR Archaeology
Posted on 03/29/2015 4:20:53 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
A stone-built cist grave carrying a skeleton and a mysterious metre-wide wall, missing from early maps and believed to have been part of a medieval monastic settlement, have been found by archaeologists during excavations carried out at a church in North Wales with foundations in the 6th century.
Experts say they immediately realised the "huge significance" of a set of large flat stones a metre below the foundations of St Mary's Church in Nefyn, where the current building was built by the Victorians in 1825 before being converted into a museum in 1977.
Lifting the stone cover, a skeleton -- identified by osteologists as a woman in her 60s who was in good health aside from some signs of arthritis -- was discovered. Human remains from the period are a rarity in Wales due to the country's acidic soil conditions.
"This type of grave is generally believed to be of an early medieval date, although due to the lack of surviving skeletal remains this hypothesis often goes untested," says Catherine Rees, of CR Archaeology.
"Amazingly, when this individual was radiocarbon dated she was found to have been buried sometime between 1180-1250 AD, which makes the lady found at Nefyn the latest known burial of this type in Wales and one of only a small number of a similar date known in the UK...
"She would have lived through some very turbulent times in Welsh history and could have lived through the rise to power of Llywelyn ap Iorwerth, or as he is more well known Llywelyn the Great, as he consolidated north and much of Wales under his control.
"She may have also been alive when the famous medieval chronicler, Gerald of Wales, stayed at Nefyn in 1188 as part of a campaign to raise support for the third crusade."
(Excerpt) Read more at culture24.org.uk ...
CR Archaeology
Neat!
That’s three finds related to Wales this week. Well, two, and then a secondhand one.
How good could her health have been, what with her dying and all?
Sure, but other than her dying, she was in great health! ;’)
Details, details ...
/johnny
She’s not dead...well, she’s...she’s, ah...probably pining for the fjords.
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