The Secrets of the Bones
The original investigation of the Paleolithic bones in Gough’s cave concluded that they showed signs of cannibalism. The bones all belonged to people who had been disarticulated in the same way as butchered animals. Their corpses had then been systematically stripped of their flesh. The bones showed signs that the flesh was carefully scrapped away to remove every trace of tissue- in some cases with human teeth as well as tools. It was a sensational and disturbing discovery- especially as one of the bodies was of a young child.
In 2017, a further team from the National History Museum re-examined the bones using more up to date technology. They concluded that the bones did indeed belong to bodies that had been systematically disarticulated and stripped of their flesh. Close analysis of cut marks corresponded with scraping and filleting- and 42% of the remains did indeed possess human teeth marks. A third of the bones had also been broken up post-mortem in a way that suggested marrow extraction. To complete the grizzly picture, the edges of some of the skulls had been carefully smoothed to make them into skull cups- after the soft tissue had been carefully removed.
Dr. Silva Bello, part of the Natural History Museum team also agreed with the initial archaeological assessment that the human remains had been cut up and butchered in the same way as the animal bones. This, taken with the other findings provided the 2017 team with “Unequivocal evidence that the bodies were eaten.” However, there were other curious marks on the bones that were not related to the butchering and de-fleshing of the bodies. Natural History Museum expert Jill Cook had first noticed these marks in 1986. Other experts, however, had dismissed them as filleting marks. But, these scores in the bones were found in areas without muscle attachments. So, the modern team decided to investigate them further.
The marks resembled a zigzag pattern, which curiously matched zigzag motifs commonly used in the picturePaleolithic art of the same period. On one of the forearm bones, this pattern covered an area of just over 6 cm. Cook had argued that the marks were made deliberately after the flesh was stripped. Bello and the team decided to look at the construction of the cuts using macro and micro morphometric analysis to help determine if they were part of the de-fleshing process. They found that the structure of the cuts was utterly different from those made during butchery. Cook was right; the marks were deliberate.
More intriguing still was the fact that the carved pattern was made in the same way as the decoration on the animal bone artifacts. However, the fact that the human bones were decorated at all was perplexing for there were relatively few examples of engraved human bones to be found across Paleolithic Europe. Something more than simple cannibalism had been going on in Gough’s cave. But what?