Free Republic

A decade ago, archaeologists made a grisly discovery when they unearthed two Neolithic mass graves at the sites of Bergheim and Achenheim in northeastern France. The pits contained severed limbs and human skeletons, evidence of excessive violence and mutilation that did not match normal Neolithic patterns. Some deceased individuals buried in other nearby graves, however, showed no signs of brutality. A new study has recently analyzed the chilling remains to try and reconstruct the identities of the individuals and determine why some were treated so cruelly, according to a statement released by the University of Oxford. Researchers conducted multi-isotopic analysis...

A gruesome discovery in eastern France casts new light on violent conflicts that took lives -- and sometimes just limbs -- around 6,000 years ago. Excavations of a 2-meter-deep circular pit in Bergheim revealed seven human skeletons plus a skull section from an infant strewn atop the remains of seven human arms, say anthropologist Fanny Chenal of Antea Archáologie in Habsheim, France, and her colleagues. Two men, one woman and four children were killed, probably in a raid or other violent encounter, the researchers report in the December Antiquity. Their bodies were piled in a pit that already contained a...