The most terrible cemeteries and graves - photos, real stories, legends, beliefs. The most mysterious ancient children's burials Photos from excavations of ancient cemeteries

Incredible facts

We tend to think of archaeologists as dusty experts who study people and their cultures through artifacts and human remains.

But sometimes they are more like ancient storytellers who, with the help found antiquities They tell the most interesting stories that magically transport us to distant times and places.

In the stories below, we are transported to the ancient worlds of long-forgotten children. Some stories touch your heart, others are simply mysterious, and some are terrible.

10. Revival of Oriens

In October 2013, in a field in Leicestershire, England, a treasure hunter used a metal detector to discover meter-long coffin of a Roman child. To avoid talking about the child in the third person, the scientific community decided to name him "Oriens", which means "to rise" (like the Sun).

It is believed that Oriens was buried in the 3rd-4th centuries. It is not known for certain how old the child was, but the bracelets on his hands suggest that it was a girl.

Bracelets from a girl's hand

Bracelets Clasp

Oriens must have lived in a wealthy family or her family had high social status, because she was found in a lead coffin, which was rare at that time, especially in matters of child burials.

Coffin inside

Most children were then interred, dressed in a shroud (clothing for the deceased). Only a few bone fragments remained from the baby. However, archaeologists have been able to piece together some details of her life, including information about the society in which she lived.

They learned a lot by analyzing some of the resins found in her coffin.

Oriens baby teeth

According to the stories of Stuart Palmer from the Warwickshire archaeological team ( Archeology Warwickshire), presence incense, olive oil, as well as pistachio nut oils in the soil, found in the coffin suggests that Oriensa can be classified as one of the very few Roman burials of people with the highest status.

The girl was buried according to very expensive Mediterranean and Middle Eastern customs.

"Nails" that held the internal components of the coffin

Resins masked the smell of a decomposing body during afterlife rituals, which, according to the ancients, facilitated the transition to afterlife. From a social point of view, this suggests that the inhabitants of Roman Britain continued to follow continental burial rites, so they must have imported oils and resins from the Middle East.

9. Secrets of a child singer

Almost 3000 years ago, seven-year-old Tjayasetimu sang in the choir in the temple of the pharaohs of Ancient Egypt. Despite the fact that the girl took most of the secrets with her to the grave, the curators of the British Museum, where her mummy was exhibited in 2014, were able to find out some details about the child.

It is not known for certain where she lived and worked, because British museum I bought the mummy from a dealer back in 1888. However, Tjayasetimu's body is incredibly well preserved. In the 1970s, as part of a restoration project, they found hieroglyphs and drawings under bandages blackened by oils on the body.

Tools that Tjayasetimu may have used

Thanks to the inscriptions, it was possible to find out her name and position. The name Tjayasetimu, which means "the goddess Isis will defeat them", protects against evil spirits. Her work as a singer in the temple was considered very important to the god Amun.

The reason why the girl received such a “position” is also unknown: her voice or family connections. What is known is that she was an important person because her body was mummified with a golden mask on her face.

Scan reveals baby girl's teeth

In 2013, a CT scan showed that her body, including her face and hair, was still well preserved. With no signs of long-term illness or injury, she is believed to have died from a short-term illness such as cholera.

8. The Mystery of the Sewer Babies

In the Roman Empire, infanticide was widely practiced to limit family size because reliable methods of birth control did not exist. This helped conserve scarce resources and improve the lives of other family members.

Children under 6 months of age were not treated as human beings at all in Roman society.

A burial was discovered in this well

However, even knowing this fact, researchers were still horrified when they made a terrible discovery in 1988 in Ashkelon, on the southern coast of Israel. Archaeologists have discovered a mass grave of almost 100 children in an ancient sewer underneath Roman baths.

Church ruins in Ashkelon

Most of the bones found were intact, and scientists believe the children were thrown into the sewer immediately after death. Considering the general age of the children and the absence of signs of disease, the cause of death was almost certainly infanticide.

Based on these bones, experts determined that the dead were infants.

Although the Romans favored male children, researchers have been unable to find evidence that they intentionally killed more female babies. They were unable to find confirmation of this even when studying this find.

Some experts note that the bathhouse above the sewer also worked as a brothel. They suggest that the babies were the unwanted children of the women of the ancient profession who worked there.

Some female infants may have been spared their lives so that they would later become courtesans. Although in the Roman Empire the oldest profession Both women and men were engaged, but the former were more in demand.

Ancient archaeological site

7. An unusual child metal workers

About 4,000 years ago, in prehistoric Britain, children were tasked with decorating jewelry and weapons with gold threads as fine as human hair. On some specimens there were more than 1000 such threads per square centimeter of wood.

Scientists discovered this after an ornate wooden dagger handle was found in the Bush Mound area near Stonehenge in the 1800s.

Daggers found at the same time in Bush. Salisbury Plain. Were discovered in the richest and most important grave Bronze Age, among all ever found in Britain

The work is so intricate that it is difficult to see all the details with the naked eye. After research, experts came to the conclusion that, most likely, teenagers and children under the age of 10 were the authors of such extraordinary craftsmanship on the handle of the dagger.

Without a magnifying glass, an ordinary adult would not be able to do this because his vision is not sharp enough. After the age of 21, a person’s vision gradually begins to deteriorate.

Although the children used simple tools, they had a special understanding of design and geometry. However, they paid a high price for beautiful handicraft. Their vision quickly deteriorated myopathy overtook them at the age of 15, and by the age of 20 they were already partially blind.

This made them unsuitable for other work, so they had to rely on their communities.

6. Very good parents

Believing that the attitude of some scientists towards Neanderthals was not entirely objective, archaeologists from the University of York decided to rewrite the history of these prehistoric people. Until recently it was believed that Neanderthal children lived dangerous, difficult and short lives.

However, the team of the above archaeologists came to different conclusions after studying the social and cultural factors of the life of the first people from finds from different times in different places throughout Europe.

"Opinions about Neanderthals are changing," says Penny Spikins, lead researcher. “Partly due to the fact that they mated with us, and this already speaks of our similarity. But the latest findings turned out to be no less important. There is a fundamental difference between a harsh childhood and a childhood spent in harsh conditions."

A Neanderthal child examines his reflection in the water. Neanderthal Museum in Kropina, Croatia

Spikins believes that Neanderthal children were very attached to their families, and families were close-knit. He also notes that children were trained to handle tools. In two places different countries A team of archaeologists discovered stones that were well processed compared to others that were chipped.

They looked like children were learning from adults how to make tools.

Although there is no conclusive evidence for this claim, Spikins believes that prehistoric children "played peek-a-boo" in imitation of adults, because the same "game" was played by humans and great apes.

When studying the burials of Neanderthal infants and children, Spikins came to the conclusion that parents interred their offspring with great care, since the remains of children, rather than adults, that have survived to this day were more often found.

The archaeological team also emphasizes that there is evidence that parents cared for their sick or injured children for several years.

The most ancient finds of archaeologists

5. Boy Scouts of Ancient Egypt

To learn about how children lived in the Ancient Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus, historians examined about 7,500 documents believed to be from the sixth century. The city was home to more than 25,000 people, and was considered the Roman administrative center of its area, in which Egypt's weaving industry flourished.

More than a century ago, artifacts from the time of the existence of Oxyrhynchus were found, after analyzing which historians came to the conclusion that in Ancient Egypt There was an active youth group of Boy Scouts known as the "gymnasium", where young people were trained to become good citizens.

Boys on a camel. Mosaic from Late Antiquity, early 6th century.

Great Palace Mosaic Museum in Istanbul, Türkiye.

Boys born into free Egyptian, Greek and Roman families were accepted for education. Despite its "affluent" demographics, gymnasium membership was limited to 10-25 percent of the city's families.

For boys who applied to study at the gymnasium, this was a transition to adult life. They became full-fledged adults when they married in their early twenties. Girls who married in their teens prepared for their role by working in their parents' homes.

Boys from free families who did not go to grammar schools began to work as children under contract for several years. Many contracts were for work in weaving production.

Roman boy with Egyptian style hairstyle. A side strand of hair is cut off and sacrificed to the gods for the upcoming coming of age ceremony. First half of the second century AD. Museum of Cultural History, Oslo.

Historians have discovered one student contract concluded with a girl. But, as it turned out, her case was unique because she was an orphan and had to pay off the debts of her late father.

Children of slaves could enter into the same work contracts as boys born into free families. But unlike the latter, who lived with their families, the children of slaves could be sold. In this case, they lived with their owners. Discovered documents showed that some slave children were sold as early as two years old.

4. The mystery of the “elk” geoglyph

In this story, our discovery of the past is driven by curiosity about what the future will hold. Images taken from space in 2011 revealed the existence of a giant elk geoglyph (a geometric pattern painted on the ground) in Ural mountains, which is believed to predate the famous thousand-year-old Nazca geoglyphs found in Peru.

A type of masonry known as "chipstone" suggests that the structure may have been built around 3000 - 4000 BC. BC.

Nazca geoglyphs

The structure is about 275 meters long with two horns, four legs and a long snout facing north. In prehistoric times, the geoglyph could be seen from a nearby ridge. He looked like a shiny white figure against the background green grass. Today this place is covered with soil.

Archaeologists were amazed at the thoughtfulness of the design. “The elk’s hooves were made from small crushed stones and clay,” explains Stanislav Grigoriev, specialist Russian Academy Sci. "The walls were very low, I believe, and the passages between them were very narrow. The situation was also in the muzzle area: rubble and clay, four small wide walls and three passages."

"Moose" geoglyph

The researchers also found evidence of two sites where fires were lit only once. They believe that these places were used for important rituals.

However, many questions remain unanswered, especially such as: who built this geoglyph and why. There is no archaeological evidence that the culture during this period was so advanced that people could have built such a structure in this region.

But experts believe that the most interesting discovery concerns children. They were able to find more than 150 instruments at the site, ranging in length from 2 to 17 centimeters. They believe that these instruments belonged to children who worked side by side with adults as part of a community project.

That is, it was not slave labor, but joint efforts in order to achieve an important goal.

Archeology: finds

3. Children of the clouds

In July 2013, in the high-altitude Amazonas region of Peru, archaeologists discovered 35 sarcophagi, each no more than 70 centimeters long. The small coffins led researchers to believe they belonged to children. mysterious culture The Chachapoya, also known as the "cloud warriors" because they lived in the rainforests of the mountains.

Between the 9th century and 1475, when their territories were conquered by the Incas, the Chachapoya founded villages and farms on steep mountain slopes, raised pigs and llamas there, and fought among themselves.

Their culture was eventually destroyed by diseases such as smallpox that European explorers brought with them.

Very little is known about the Chachapoyas and their children because they did not leave any written language behind. However, according to Spanish documents from the 1500s, they were fierce warriors.

Pedro Cieza de Leon, who chronicled the history of Peru, described them as follows: appearance: "They are the whitest and most beautiful of all the people I have seen in India, and their wives are so beautiful that because of their gentleness, many of them deserve to be the wives of the Incas and live in the temple of the Sun."

But these cloud warriors did leave something behind: mummified bodies in unusual and strange sarcophagi that were found on high ledges overlooking the valley. The clay coffins were arranged vertically and were very similar in design to the decoration of people: tunics, jewelry and even trophy skulls.

But no one knows why children were buried in their own cemetery separately from adults. It is also unclear why all the small sarcophagi “looked” to the west, while the adult coffins were positioned differently.

Mysterious archaeological finds

2. Gifts to the gods of the lakes

Ancient Bronze Age villages spread out around the alpine lakes of Germany and Switzerland. When some of the villages were discovered during excavations in the 1970s and 1980s, archaeologists couldn't be happier because they found more than 160 houses aged 2600 - 3800 years.

These were the houses along coastal strip lakes that were flooded. To protect themselves from rising water levels, residents often moved to less dangerous areas, closer to land. When conditions improved, they returned again.

Rescue archaeological excavations settlement Petelino-1 spent the summer in the Moscow region at the Institute of Archeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Archaeologists under the leadership of Alexey Viktorovich Alekseev excavated one of ancient settlements Moscow region. In the 14th century, the village of Dmitrieva Slobodka, which belonged to the Great Moscow Prince Dmitry Donskoy, was located here - the administrative and economic center of a large and rich volost. Dmitrieva Slobodka was mentioned more than once in the wills of Moscow princes and major state acts as an important point. Excavations also captured part of the ancient medieval necropolis of the XIV-XVI centuries from big amount burials. Found a large number of rare and interesting finds: white stone tombstones, stone cross, pectoral crosses, silver coins, icons, applied seals, silver belt overlays, a lot of ceramics from the 14th-16th centuries and more.
Photos are clickable, with geographical coordinates and linked to a Yandex map, 06-07.2016.

Historical information, excavation diagram, the beginning of rescue excavations of the Petelino-1 settlement, as well as a small educational program on archeology here:
Excavations of Petelino-1, medieval necropolis, part 1
Excavations of the Petelino-1 settlement, video tour

1. All that has been preserved from man is the strongest bones and a loose skull. Notice how shallowly he was buried, only about 60 cm from the then ground level

2. Another grave with the preserved remains of a person and a coffin (beginning - photo 37,38 of the previous part). It later turned out that this is the best preserved burial of all those found. The coffins then were anthropomorphic logs hollowed out of solid wood.

3. Nobody canceled paperwork

4. Medieval cross

5. Good find - silver coin of the Golden Horde, dirham of Khan Berdibek (758-760/1357-1359)

6. Berdibek dirham turnover

7. Pectoral cross and dirham

8. Panorama of the excavations, graves are visible

9. Already dug graves, medieval gravestones and grave spots (rectangles that stand out against the background of the mainland)

11. Two open graves are visible. First one half is removed, then the other.

13. Cleaning up the burial site with 2 photos. Work in progress knife and brush, probably the slowest and most tedious part of the excavation

15. All extracted soil is sown through a sieve in search of artifacts

16. After cleaning, the bones of the hands and phalanges of the fingers became visible (compare with photo 13)

17. And this is a grave within a grave. The later burial is partially located on the earlier one. Human remains have dissolved, only the skull is partially preserved

18. Here also one grave meets another. Traces of a decayed deck are visible; human remains have not been preserved

19. Finally, the remains from the grave from the 2nd photo were completely cleared. It took a couple of days to clean up

23. Traces of a group grave, we assumed a family burial there and had high hopes for the excavation of this grave

24. Smoke break, on the right the beginning of the excavation of the group grave from the previous photo

25. Unfortunately, hopes were not realized; human remains were not preserved in this grave. It was possible to find only a trace of the skull - a cavity in the ground in the shape of a skull (Pompeii immediately comes to mind). However, its location confirmed our guess about a group burial

26. All that remains of a person is a hole in the ground in the shape of a skull

27. We started digging further and discovered another cavity from the skull. And between them is the trace of another small burial. Most likely it was a family with a child

28. And this is a burial with a preserved skull, presumably of a child. Small eye sockets with a large skull suggest a disease (rickets?). By the way, at the end of the excavations, all the bones were sent to anthropologists for analysis and research

29. The beginning of clearing the burial from photo 18, the remains of a skull and traces of a log are visible

30. During the excavations, many fragments of ceramics from the 14th-17th centuries were found. At the same time, practically nothing was found in the grave itself (I explain why this happened in the video and the previous part)

31. Burial with photos 18, 29 after clearing

32. And this Chief Specialist for clearing burials. Not everyone is capable long time Using a knife, a needle and a brush to clear bones is a rather labor-intensive task that requires perseverance and patience

33. Found ceramics, XIV-XV centuries

34. Corolla of a fragment of a medieval ceramic vessel

36. Corolla profile from the previous photo

37. Pay attention to the wavy pattern, this is the XIV-XV century

43. Medieval ceramics

44. An unusual find - a fragment of a 14th-century Black Sea amphora (right)

46. ​​Corollas of ceramic vessels of the 14th-15th centuries, wavy lines are visible.

48. During the excavations, reporters from the Russia-24 channel came to us to film documentary about archaeological excavations. Head of the expedition Alekseev A.V. gives them an interview. I'll post a link to the movie later.

49. The most remarkable and valuable finds are photographed

On July 8, archaeological excavations began at the former site of the Volgacable plant. This is the first scientific research of the All Saints Cemetery in more than eight decades that have passed since the moment the largest pre-revolutionary urban necropolis began to be continuously barbarically destroyed. For the first time, the remains of Samarans who died about a century ago and were buried at Vsesvyatsky will be reburied, and not mixed with mountains of construction waste. How this was done in previous decades under different political regimes and rulers.

Combining engineer Zimin’s 1996 plan with Google Maps from camapka.ru it is clear that the territory of "Volgakabel", where archaeologists are now working, occupies the oldest part of the necropolis, designated as the "Old Orthodox Cemetery".

The area where the excavation site is now filled is, although heavily disturbed, a surviving part of the Old Cemetery, which has been continuously destroyed since the 1930s. It should be noted that during the construction work on the construction of the Gudok shopping center on the territory of the former factory, interrupted for archaeological research, the remaining part of the cemetery was practically not damaged.

This is the only one found on this moment tombstone. The stone lay in a layer of construction debris, so its relationship to that other grave cannot be established.

It is possible that the bones of the Chizhovs will never be found again.

By the way, the black marble monument was ordered in Moscow.

Most likely, as a result of the excavations, no one will be personally identified. Thanks to the developers of the 1930s.

In 1930, the City Council issued a decree “On the sale of monuments, crosses, grilles and tombstones and signs within the city limits.” Its result was the almost complete disappearance of identifying marks of the graves of the All Saints Cemetery. Over the course of several years, looters stole tombstones and fences, turning the territory of the necropolis into a giant wasteland and making the graves nameless. It is from this moment that the burial places of the mothers of Alexei Nikolaevich Tolstoy and Fyodor Ivanovich Chaliapin can be considered irretrievably lost, famous philanthropist and local historian Konstantin Pavlovich Golovkin and the great historian Academician Sergei Fedorovich Platonov.

After this, even that small section of the Old Orthodox Cemetery, which survived the construction of the plant’s workshops, was significantly damaged.

In the 1950s, ceramic pipes were laid on the site and the bones were thrown into a dump.

A collector installed directly in a brick crypt. Probably at the same time as pipe laying.

A well shaft installed directly onto a burial site.

Archaeological research on the surviving sites began last Monday.

The regional Ministry of Culture reports on the progress of work almost daily. But the volumes of even the preserved area are enormous. And archaeologists, apparently, will stay here for a long time.

Everything is done according to science. This Scientific research necropolis, rather than a simple reburial of remains. Everything is recorded, sketched...

Doctor analyzes bone remains historical sciences Alexander Alexandrovich Khokhlov.

The sex of the deceased, pathologies and diseases are determined.

The excavation works are carried out by people with considerable experience in archaeological research and students of Samara universities.

Many burial grounds were destroyed by construction work in the 1940s-1980s. Skeletons are not always found complete. Sometimes bones are not found in anatomical order.

However, the clearing of the remaining area is being carried out quite meticulously.

One of the few well-preserved intact burials.

Vessels are often found in coffins at Vsesvyatsky.

According to one version, these are oil vessels. According to tradition, the oil remaining from the sacrament of unction was poured into the coffin of the deceased. It is possible that the vessel from this oil was placed there.

A grave of strange origins that scientists will have to deal with in the future. Several still-unrigid corpses were randomly dumped into it.

And a little about the finds made last week...

The finds are collected, processed, and then transferred to the museum collection.

Cross from a priest's grave. In addition, a decayed Psalter was found in it.

Cross made of semi-precious stone.

Pectoral crosses of a more familiar type to our contemporaries are more common.

Cross and decayed icon.

The fabric in the burials had decayed, but two woven black scarves were found.

Metal decoration detail. Probably from the wreath.

Outside the excavation area you can see new buildings built on the territory of the same cemetery. Without conducting any archaeological research. One can only guess about the fate of the remains of the Samarans located underneath them.

If you dream of a fresh grave, then someone’s dishonest act will cause you terrible suffering, or this dream foreshadows danger threatening you.

A dream about a grave most often promises troubles and illness.

Walking among the graves in a dream means an unsuccessful marriage. Look into empty grave- to the loss of loved ones.

Seeing a person half covered with earth in an unfilled grave foreshadows the danger that threatens him in reality. Seeing your grave is a harbinger of intrigues being prepared against you.

Digging a grave in a dream is a sign that your opponents are ready to crush you, but if you manage to finish your work in a dream, in reality you will defeat them. An unfavorable dream is in which you see that the corpse for which a grave was dug has disappeared - this dream promises bad news.

If you dream that night found you in a cemetery and you have to spend the night in an open grave, this means the loss of friends, the cooling of your lover.

Sometimes a grave in a dream foreshadows troubles at work.

An old, dilapidated grave means someone's dangerous illness and death.

If in a dream you read inscriptions on graves, it means that you will have unpleasant troubles.

Brain, brains Seeing your own brain in a dream means that some unfavorable circumstances will irritate you and connect you with an unpleasant companion, companion. Seeing the brains of animals portends mental suffering from everyday adversity.

If you eat brains, it means that you will unexpectedly acquire great knowledge and profit.

Subscribe to the Dream Interpretation channel!

In which we participated.
Excavations were carried out in front of the Church of St. Nicholas, known since the 14th century. (more about it - ), and the city of Bychyna was first mentioned in 1228. The cemetery appeared here long before the construction of the existing church. Probably back in the 10th century, because in another part of the burial ground there were burials according to the rite of cremation, and in “ours” there were redeposited bones from corpse cremations - archaeologists call them calcined. Subsequently (from the middle of the 16th century) the church belonged to Protestants. Accordingly, residents of the city were buried in the cemetery for centuries. Around the 18th century, cemeteries began to be moved outside the city limits and burials here ceased.

We joined the work at the end of September. Archaeologists from the University of Opole, led by prof. By this time, Magdalena Przysiężna-Pizarska had been working for several months and was conducting rescue excavations. This is due to the fact that active construction and restoration work is underway in Bychin, which should be preceded by preventive research.

This trip took place within the framework of the cooperation program between Novgorod State University and the University of Opole. In the summer, a group of archaeologists from the Institute of History of the University of Opole came to us in Russa for excavations, and in the fall we paid them a return visit.
Before this, only two of us had repeatedly participated in the study of necropolises in Veliky Novgorod, Staraya Russa and other places in the Novgorod region, the rest were doing it for the first time.

In principle, the research methodology is not very complicated. Before moving on to the story about the necropolis, I’ll try to describe the methodology in a nutshell (in principle, I already wrote about this - but I’ll repeat it).
First, the earth is removed in thin layers until the burial appears.

Then they carefully clear the skeleton using scoops, trowels, knives, spoons, toothpicks and other tools. At the same time, they try to identify the contours of the pit and the remains of burial structures.

You have to work in close quarters, carefully choosing a place where you can sit or put your foot -

After this, the burial is drawn and photographed -

On a sunny day for photography, you have to create shadow with improvised means -

Once I had to take a break from work to give an interview to local journalists -

The skeleton is disassembled and packed into a box. All soil is examined and moved. In addition, at the request of our colleagues, we worked with a metal detector to check the dump. As it turned out, they did not use the device they had at all, and we work with it constantly.

The soil here is sandy and dry, so the preservation of organic materials is quite poor. Often, only dust remained from the bones (Polish colleagues explained the specific preservation of several bones, decomposed to the stage of flour, by the fact that the buried person suffered from bone tuberculosis during his lifetime).

The cemetery can tell a lot about the city and its inhabitants.

The first thing to note is that this is a city church cemetery, so numerous burials were in layers. This is due to the fact that the territory is small and new graves were dug in the place of old ones, destroying them. Respectively, most of The burials have not reached us completely.

There were practically no grave goods in the burials. This is due to the belief that a Christian does not take anything with him to the afterlife, so he does not need anything other than a shroud and a coffin.

Very rarely, coins were found in burials, probably serving as the “obol of the dead” -

Most often, the state of preservation was deplorable. Although there were also readable coins -

One of the most interesting finds was a counterfeit coin made of bronze-plated iron.
Beads were occasionally found. This, for example, is a bone bead from a rosary -

And this is glass -

Numerous metal parts of coffins were also found - nails (in almost every burial) or a handle like this -

Bronze pins fastening the shroud were quite common. There were a lot of small (up to 3 x 3 mm) shapeless bronze fragments, very strongly oxidized in the layer.

Despite the lack of objects, human remains can tell quite a lot about life and death in ancient times.

Here, for example, is one of the burials -

Just a baby. There were strips of decay left from the coffin, the bones were also almost rotten. If you enlarge the photo, you can see a coin lying at the foot and thin bronze pins that held the diapers together.

In general, it should be noted that in the Middle Ages (and in other times in modern times) infant mortality was very high, so in the cemeteries of this time there are many children’s, and especially infant, burials. There are often many more of them than adults. And it’s no wonder with infant mortality exceeding 50%. So if someone says that before everyone ate only natural food, breathed clean air, moved a lot and therefore were healthy and lived long - spit in his eyes, don’t believe him. It’s just that this man has never excavated a medieval cemetery.

The mortality rate among women during pregnancy and childbirth was also high. Therefore, double burials are not uncommon. In this case, the baby was most often placed at the mother’s feet.

Like here, for example -

In principle, this picture is practically no different from the medieval cemeteries of Novgorod and Staraya Russa.
But we also encountered a lot of unusual things.

For example, the position of the bodies. Almost all Christians are buried lying on their backs, with their heads to the west. In all our practice, we only once encountered a burial oriented differently - with its head facing east. And even then, this is most likely due to the fact that the deceased was buried in closed coffin and confused the headboard with the footboard.

At the cemetery in Bychin, some of the burials are oriented differently.

There were skeletons oriented along a north-south line. Some were buried face down.

Like, for example, here -

The burials are arranged crosswise, and one of the dead lies face down, with his hands behind his back.

And here the bodies seemed to have been thrown face down into a common grave. The hand of one lies on the back of the other

This group burial is also unusual -

On two skeletons you can see stones that were placed on the throats of the dead during burial -

This is not an accident.

There are such stones in other burials (but not in all). What this means is unclear, but one can guess that the residents were afraid that the deceased might rise from the grave (in Slavic mythology they were called hostage dead and tried to stop him. The most amazing thing is that such stones are even in children's burials.

This custom was quite widespread in the past in Poland, and indeed in Europe in general.
Here is a burial from the 16th century. with a brick placed in its mouth, excavated in Pisa (Italy) -

But here is a very unusual burial discovered in Poland in a cemetery of the 17th-18th centuries. - a woman buried with a sickle at her throat -

What is the reason for this custom? Unanimous opinion not yet, but the authors of the articles (images from which are shown above) believe that stones were used to press down the dead of those who died from infectious diseases (plague or cholera, for example). Obviously, those who did this considered such dead victims of “vampires”, “the walking dead” (or some other evil spirits, see for example -