They revealed the causes of a thousand-year-old massacre that killed 21 children and 20 adults 6,200 years ago

About 6,200 years ago, 41 people in what is now Croatia were killed and buried in a mass grave, and members of their own community may have murdered them, according to a new analysis of the remains.

Adult men and women were among the dead, but the group was between 2 and 50 years old and about half of the skeletons belonged to children. Most of the fatal blows were to the skull which landed from behind, and there were no marks on the arm bones to indicate that the victims attempted to defend themselves from their attackers, the scientists reported in a report. new study.

Genetic analysis has shown thatAbout 70% of those who died were not closely related to other victims, but instead shared a common ancestor. LInvestigators suspect that the massacre may have been caused by a a sudden population boom or a change in climatic conditions that have depleted resources and led to indiscriminate mass killings.

The grave was discovered in 2007, when a man living in a small town in the hills of Potočani, Croatia, was digging the foundation for a garage, and heavy rains uncovered a grave containing dozens of skeletons. Archaeologists from the University of Zagreb were investigating nearby and were able to start investigating the mass grave the day it was found, said Mario Novak, lead author of the new study and head of the Evolutionary Anthropology Laboratory and research bioarchaeology. Zagreb Anthropological Institute, Croatia.

The well is small It is approximately 6.5 feet (2 meters) in diameter and 3 feet (1 m) deep, and at least 41 bodies have been unceremoniously dumped in it. At first, archaeologists believed the remains were modern, either from WWII or the Croatian War of Independence in the 1990s, Novak told Live Science. But there were no contemporary objects in the well, only shards of pottery that looked prehistoric. And when investigators inspected the victims’ teeth, they found no dental fillings.. Radiocarbon dating of bones, soil, and pottery shards confirmed the age of the burial, dating to around 4200 BC. vs.

The researchers identified 21 of the victims as children between 2 and 17 years old and 20 as adults between 18 and 50 years old; 21 of the dead were men and 20 women.

But how did they end up buried together? For the new study, Novak and his colleagues took DNA samples from the remains and analyzed the bones of 38 people. When investigators inspected the bodies, found that most had at least one traumatic injury to the back of the skull, and some skulls had up to four punctures. Mass graves in medieval Europe frequently contained people of all ages and genders who succumbed to the Black Death, but the victims of the Potočani well died from violence and not from infectious diseases Novak explained.

“The only plausible scenario was a massacre”, He said.

The distribution of males and females, and adults and children, was roughly equal, and they had no limb or face injuries, so they likely weren’t killed in a skirmish. during the fight. It is not known whether the victims were immobilized or unable to defend themselves: “If someone attacks you with a club or a sword, you reflexively lift your forearm to protect your head. who would have left at least some remains with cut marks on the bones of the arm “, dijo Novak. “But we didn’t see any facial injuries or any defensive injuries.”

Genetic data has shown that only 11 of the victims were close relatives, so the massacre did not target a specific family group. It also didn’t sound like a discriminatory planned murder, in which enemies tended to murder older men while capturing women.

“In this case, it was just a random massacre, regardless of gender and age”, dijo Novak.

Unlike a recently described Neolithic burial pit in Spain which also contained a jumble of skeletons, male and female, young and old, DNA from Croatian grave victims has shown that although they were not close relatives, they had ancestors. in common, which indicates that they were not newcomers – as in the Spanish case – and that their deaths were not due to a will of the indigenous community to protect their territory.

“It can be ruled out that this massacre was associated with the influx of new immigrants”, dijo Novak.

The most likely explanation is one that archaeologists and climatologists have suggested for other ancient massacre sites in Germany and Austria dating from around 5,000 years ago, in which adults and children were also killed. indiscriminately and thrown into shallow mass graves. In these scenariosProlonged climate change that caused floods or droughts, perhaps combined with an unexpected population boom, could have sparked conflicts over precious resources. And in Potočani, one of those struggles turned deadly.

“By studying these ancient massacres, we could try to gain insight into the psychology of these people and perhaps try to prevent similar events today,” dijo Novak.

“We have evidence of ancient massacres dating back at least 10,000 years. Today we also have modern massacres; the only thing that has changed is that we now have more effective means and weapons to do these things. But I don’t think human nature or human psychology has changed much, ”he added.

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