New Study Reveals Chilling Secret of Iron Age War Cemetery

Yahoo

2 days ago

A new study published by archaeologists at Bournemouth University (published in the Oxford Journal of Archaeology) has revealed surprising information about bodies found at a 'war cemetery' at the Iron Age site of Maiden Castle in Dorset, one of the U.K.'s most famous archaeological sites.When the burials were initially discovered in 1936, archaeologists believed that they died from a single battle. But after renewed analyses using radiocarbon dating, researchers found that rather than perishing in one mass-casualty event, the individuals had been killed due to violent clashes throughout many generations, from late first century B.C. until late first century A.D. 'The find of dozens of human skeletons displaying lethal weapon injuries was never in doubt, however, by undertaking a systematic programme of radiocarbon dating we have been able to establish that these individuals died over a period of decades, rather than a single terrible event,' said Martin Smith, Associate Professor in Forensic and Biological Anthropology at Bournemouth, who analyzed the bodies.Scientists believe the cause of the deaths could have stemmed from an era of dynastic turmoil or localized tension, resulting in executions. Whatever the cause, the new discovery upends decades of assumptions on behalf of researchers.
'Since the 1930s, the story of Britons fighting Romans at one of the largest hillforts in the country has become a fixture in historical literature,' Miles Russell, the dig's director, explained. 'With the Second World War fast approaching, no one was really prepared to question the results. The tale of innocent men and women of the local Durotriges tribe being slaughtered by Rome is powerful and poignant. It features in countless articles, books, and TV documentaries. It has become a defining moment in British history, marking the sudden and violent end of the Iron Age.'The trouble is it doesn't appear to have actually happened,' Russell added. 'Unfortunately, the archaeological evidence now points to it being untrue. This was a case of Britons killing Britons, the dead being buried in a long-abandoned fortification. The Roman army committed many atrocities, but this does not appear to be one of them.'
Researchers are now scrambling to recontextualize the site, with much of what they assumed about the cemetery at Maiden Castle proving erroneous. "The intermingling of differing cultural burial practices contemporaneously shows that simplistic approaches to interpreting archaeological cemeteries must now be questioned,' said Bournemouth archaeological scientist Paul Cheetham. 'Here we have either a number of distinct cultures living and dying together, or that an individual's burial right was determined by complex social rules and/or hierarchical divisions within this Iron Age society."In addition to the renewed context surrounding the bodies already found, the team is now asking themselves what other undiscovered secrets might lie around the grounds of Maiden Castle. 'Whilst Wheeler's excavation was excellent in itself, he was only able to investigate a fraction of the site,' Cheetham said. 'It is likely that a larger number of burials still remains undiscovered around the immense ramparts."New Study Reveals Chilling Secret of Iron Age War Cemetery first appeared on Men's Journal on May 29, 2025