Subscribe now for full access and no adverts
Rare evidence for a Roman crucifixion has been found at Fenstanton in Cambridgeshire, where Albion Archaeology excavated the remains of a 25- to 35-year-old man from a grave in one of five small cemeteries around a recently discovered Roman settlement in the area.
Off-site analysis revealed that the man’s right heel bone had been pierced horizontally by an iron nail, and osteologist Corinne Duhig (University of Cambridge) established that he must have been crucified, suggesting, based on other injuries, that he may have been a slave.
The man’s bones have been radiocarbon dated to between AD 130 and 360. Emperor Constantine (r. 306-337) is believed to have banned crucifixion, so he probably died between AD 130 and 337. The discovery (initially published in British Archaeology) is the first of its kind from northern Europe and the best physical evidence of a crucifixion in the Roman world.
