An episode of mass cannibalism is said to have taken place 4,000 years ago in England

The macabre imagination runs wild when reading a scientific article published on December 16 in the journal Antiquity. It describes the skeletal remains of at least 37 individuals, women, men and children, violently murdered, dismembered and dismembered, then thrown into a natural well, around four thousand years ago, in what is now Somerset ( United Kingdom).

Let us judge: “Cut marks, often multiple, were found on 20% of the human remains, and a third showed signs of perimortem fractures”; “the majority of the cuts appear to have been made with stone tools rather than metal” ; “one of the most complete skulls shows multiple marks on the frontal bone, suggesting removal of the scalp” ; “in at least five mandibles, a powerful masticatory muscle has been severed, facilitating the separation of the lower jaw” ; “in at least one case, cutouts suggest tongue removal” ; “the types of percussion and fracturing are consistent with marrow extraction (…) of the femur » ; “a small number of small bones in the hands and feet show fresh fractures consistent with the flat molars of omnivores, including humans, rather than punctures made by carnivores”.

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