Mass murder in Iron Age Europe may have been a 'message' to neighbours
An examination of the remains of 77 people from Gomolava revealed: there were almost no men among the victims, and most of the dead were not related - scientists say the violence was targeted.
Archaeologists have said that women and children were probably killed deliberately in one of the largest prehistoric mass graves in Europe. The discovery was made at the Gomolava monument in northern Serbia: in one grave they found the remains of 77 people buried some 2,800 years ago.
According to the authors of the paper, published in Nature Human Behaviour, people died violently - there are traces of blows and wounds (for example, from blunt force and stabbing injuries). The "structure" of the victims is particularly unusual: 40 children 1-12 years old, 11 adolescents and 24 adults, and among the adults, about 87 per cent were women.
At first, the researchers assumed that it could have been a family or residents of the same settlement who died during the attack. But genetic analyses revealed the unexpected: most of the people studied were not close relatives - that is, they were not "one big family" killed together.
Isotope analyses provided further evidence: from the composition of teeth and bones, scientists saw different nutrition in childhood, which could suggest that the people came from different places - perhaps they were captured or forcibly relocated and then killed.
Another oddity is exactly how the dead were buried. In such mass graves, belongings were often taken away and the bodies were simply thrown into the pit. Here, according to the researchers' description, personal items (such as bronze jewellery and ceramic vessels) and the remains of an animal (like a slaughtered calf) were found next to the bodies. On top of the grave lay broken grain grinders and burnt seeds - seemingly actions that had symbolic meaning.
The authors believe that this was neither a random attack nor a "normal" massacre. The choice of victims (mostly women and children, with many of the children also girls) may suggest an attempt to intimidate and humiliate an entire community - a 'message' to neighbours at a time of conflict over land and resources.
Researchers link the tragedy to a tense time in the Carpathian Basin, when communities were building fortified settlements and redeveloping old territories - and the struggle for control could lead to extremely violent episodes.