News Anthropology

Britain’s largest ancient massacre may have included cannibalism

Bones of at least 37 Bronze Age victims found in a shaft had tool incisions and human gnaw marks

On the left, an image of the left side of a human skull, including the whole nose and mouth region, against a black background. On the right, a close-up of a sheet of bone with a puncture wound mark in it.

Marks on nearly half of the 20 skulls pulled from a British mass grave holding the remains of at least 37 people bear marks of lethal blows to the head.

R.J. Schulting et al/Antiquity 2024

By Bruce Bower

A 4,000-year-old murder mystery began with a massacre in what’s now southwestern England.