Paris [France], April 17 : Over 5,500 years ago, two women were tied up and probably buried alive in a ritual sacrifice in France using a form of torture associated today with the Italian Mafia, an analysis of skeletons discovered at an archaeological site showed, according to CNN.
The researchers investigated the unusual position of three female skeletons found in 1985 in the town of Saint-Paul-Trois-Chateaux, a commune in southwest France, and concluded that two of the women probably died from a form of torture known as "incaprettamento."
Incaprettamento involves tying a person's throat and ankles so that they eventually strangle themselves due to the position of their legs, reported CNN.
The researchers further reviewed the skeletons found at other archaeological sites across Europe and identified 20 other probable instances of similar sacrificial killings.
According to a study published in the journal Science Advances, the practice may have been relatively widespread in Neolithic, or late Stone Age, Europe.
The third woman found at the site was in a normal burial position and "we don't know how she died," Eric Crubezy, one of the paper's lead authors and a biological anthropologist at Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse, said.
"But we can say that they put the three women in the grave at the same time," Crubezy added.
The women's burial place was aligned with the sunrise at the summer solstice and the sunset at the winter solstice, leading the study's authors to hypothesise that this site acted as somewhere people gathered to mark the turning of the seasons, which may have involved human sacrifices.
"There is always this idea that somebody is dying and that the crops will grow," Crubezy said, referencing other cultures's beliefs, such as the Inca practice of human sacrifice in South America, CNN reported.
Crubezy was part of the original team that excavated the site in 1985 but it wasn't until the break caused by the COVID-19 pandemic that he and his colleagues set about researching other instances of such sacrifices.
Moreover, the researchers highlighted 20 other probable examples of people being sacrificed in the same way over 2,000 years in the Neolithic period, by reviewing the existing literature.
The study said the actual number was probably higher but there was insufficient information about skeletons at other archaeological sites to draw firm conclusions.
"In different parts of Europe, it was the same type of sacrifice," Crubezy said, adding, "This sacrifice is very particular because it's a cruel one...and you have no blood and no people killed another, the people killed themselves."
The study further emphasised that it is impossible to prove definitely that the women in the grave at Saint-Paul-Trois-Chateaux died in that position.
Moreover, their position, being "stacked atop each other and entwined with fragments of grindstones," implied that they were placed there forcefully and deliberately, "strongly suggesting that their demise likely occurred" in the grave, the study said, according to CNN.
Co-author Ameline Alcouffe, a doctoral student at Paul Sabatier University, stressed that the study can state with "95 per cent certainty that the three individuals were women," after precisely measuring various characteristics of the pelvic bone.
At the other sites across Europe, children, men and women were also found sacrificed in this way, the study added.
Crubezy said that in future, the researchers intend to analyse the familial relationship between the three women at Saint-Paul-Trois-Chateaux and investigate unusual death rites observed in other graves around the site, reported CNN.
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor