A chilling discovery was made by archaeologists in gardens, a few meters from Leicester Cathedral. Excavations brought to light a narrow, vertical structure filled with the remains of 123 men, women and children. The 12th-century trench was found during the construction of a teaching center at Leicester Cathedral – the site where Richard III’s remains were found.
The mystery surrounding mass burials
It is one of the largest burial pits to have come to light in the UK, and subsequent study suggests the bodies were placed there more than 800 years ago, in the early 12u century. However, why the bodies of the dead were put into these tiny, ancient wells remains a mystery.
«The bones bear no signs of violence – which leaves two possible, alternative causes of death: starvation or pestilence“, explains Mathew Morris, project manager of the archaeological services at the University of Leicester. “Now, our prevailing working hypothesis is death from infectious diseases.’
Excavations conducted by Morris and his colleagues suggest that the bodies were not placed all together at the site, but in three different phases, one in quick succession.
«It seems as if successive wagon loads of corpses were brought into the well and dumped inside it, one after the other, within a very short period of time.” describes. “As for the numbers, the people found there correspond to about 5% of the city’s population.”
The discovery of the mass burial provides a vivid visual representation of life in England eight centuries ago, Morris explains.
“Other mass burials have been discovered in the area, but this particular one is the largest. In fact, it is very difficult to compare its size with any other mass burial in the country.”
The collection of historical manuscripts “the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle” has repeated references to plagues and fevers, high mortality and horrific deaths from hunger and starvation in England from the mid-10u century, until the middle of the 12thu century, says Morris.
«The mass burial falls within this time frame and offers tangible evidence of what was happening across the nation at the time.”
Accidental discovery
The discovery of the mass burial is a result of the decision to build a new educational center for cultural heritage in the cathedral.
Twelve years ago, the body of Richard III was discovered under a nearby car park and subsequently buried in the cathedral, leading to a tenfold increase in visitor numbers.
To manage the influx, the construction of a new center was approved, with the support of the National Heritage Fund for England, in the cathedral garden, and former burial ground, following the conduct of a comprehensive archaeological survey.
The research has now been completed by Morris and colleagues. In the garden, they discovered the bones of 1,237 men, women and children, from those buried in the 19th century to those buried in the early 11th century.
“It’s an 850-year unbroken sequence of burials, from a single population and from the same place, which you don’t come across very often,” observes Morris. “It has yielded many archaeological finds.”
Fragment of Roman pottery
Beneath these burials, the team discovered evidence of Anglo-Saxon settlements and, even deeper, a Roman temple. The most shocking element of all, was a small vertical shaft discovered on one side of the excavation: , containing the remains of 123 people.
Initially, the team hypothesized that these people were victims of the Black Death, the outbreak of the bubonic plague that struck England in 1348 and is estimated to have killed a significant portion of the population.
“At first, we thought it was the first evidence of the Black Death when it hit Leicester,” explains Morris.
“The team then obtained the results of the radiocarbon dating of the bones from the well. According to them, the bodies had been dumped there almost 150 years earlier, around the beginning of the 12th centuryu century”.
“It was a surprise”, admits o Morris. “Today, we have no idea what could have caused the mass deaths. As far as we know, the bubonic plague did not reach the shores of England until 1348. So what was the cause of the mass deaths then?’
To answer this question, Leicester’s team sent some samples from the corpses in the trench to geneticists at the Francis Crick Institute in London, in order to investigate the possibility of viruses, bacteria or parasites that may have triggered the plague that struck. Leicester.
“Reminiscent of recent history”
«It was a devastating outbreak that echoes recent events such as its pandemic covidMorris said. “But it is also important to note that there was still some form of political control. Someone was driving around with the carriage and collecting the corpses. What emerges from the study of the bodies in the well, does not testify that there was a panic.”
He also adds that, “dthere were no signs of clothing on any of the bodies – no buckles, no buckles, nothing to indicate that these were the people who were lying dead in the streets before they were rounded up and thrown away.”
“There are signs that they still had their limbs because they were wrapped in shrouds. Families were preparing their bodies for burial before a representative of a central agency came to collect them for burial.”
Source: www.enikos.gr
