Recently published research suggests that the bones found around Brading Roman Villa could reflect violent events linked to 4th-century political upheaval. Kathryn Krakowka reports.
Analysis of an Iron Age mass grave in northern Serbia reveals surprising new information about the group of individuals buried here. Gomolava is a tell site in the Pannonian Plain that was first occupied in the 6th millennium BC and…
Excavations at Wandlebury Country Park, just south of Cambridge, have uncovered a large burial pit containing the remains of at least ten individuals who died violently in the 8th- to 9th-century AD (below). The Department of Archaeology at the University…
Mass graves and migration in Neolithic France Recent isotopic analysis of human remains from Neolithic mass graves found at Bergheim and Achenheim in Alsace, France, have shed new light on the life histories of these individuals. Each pit was found…
Recent analysis has shed new light on the circumstances surrounding a pair of unusual Neolithic mass graves in north-east France. Around a decade ago, two late Middle Neolithic burial pits were discovered at the sites of Bergheim and Achenheim in…
REVIEW BY RP The early medieval period is often thought of as a hotbed of violence. It is perhaps, then, a surprise to learn that only around 90 reported murders exist from five centuries of Anglo-Saxon England. Annie Whitehead’s book…
Analysis of arrowheads from Bronze Age Europe is uncovering new details about an ancient battle that took place in the Tollense Valley.
The Crusades are known for spectacular military engagements. But they also saw all manner of crimes committed beyond the battlefield. In a new book, Steve Tibble uncovers some dark secrets.
Continuing his series of articles on Predynastic Egypt (see AE 127, 135, and 137), Julian Heath now looks at evidence for the disputes that arose between different groups of early settlers.
A recent study aimed to determine whether stone axes and adzes – common tools during the Neolithic – were also used as weapons.
In this month’s ‘Science Notes’, we will explore the evidence for this hypothesis, and examine how violence-related injuries are distinguished in archaeological human remains.
Several bog bodies are famous for being extremely well-preserved, such as Lindow Man from the United Kingdom, and Tollund Man from Denmark.
In the conclusion to this two-part article, Richard Hodges examines the circumstances surrounding the attack on the Benedictine monastery of San Vincenzo al Volturno in AD 881.
Why did collecting human heads as trophies become so widespread along the south coast of Peru, and who were they being taken from? Lidio M Valdez examines the extraordinary and chilling implications of the archaeology of the Acari valley.
Tragically, massacres have been a regular feature of human conflict – and locations as varied as Amritsar and Srebrenica, Rwanda and Guatemala, Malmedy and My Lai have all earned their places in the annals of infamy. But while examples of indiscriminate mass killing may sadly be relatively commonplace, each has its own uniquely terrible story – the appalling product of time, place and a particular set of circumstances.
It is believed that this group may represent a Viking population who had settled in Oxford for some years.
Post-excavation analysis is now shedding more light on the final days of La Hoya and the devastating attack on the settlement.
Iberian Iron Age massacre The Iron Age settlement of La Hoya in the Ebro River Valley in Spain was discovered in 1935 and excavated between 1973 and 1990. It was known then that a violent attack must have taken place,…
Atrocities were mercifully few in America’s most bloody war. But the exceptions were grim. Frederick Chiaventone recalls the Lawrence Massacre.