Britons did this as part of 15,000 centuries-old mortuary practices. A new study on human remains taken from Gough’s Cave, Somerset, has confirmed this. Researchers from University College London and the Natural History Museum in London as well as a variety of Universities in Spain have found that early Britons were cannibalistic. It is rare to find ancient human burial places. To their surprise, however, several remains of ancient humans have been found by anthropologists over the years. They are from Gough’s cave, which is located in Cheddar Gorge, Somerset on the Mendip Hills, Cheddar. The bones were carefully examined and published. Natural History Museum scientists discovered that Britain was the home of some of the oldest known human skull-cups. Human chewing can cause damage to rib bones. This includes cuts made with saw-teeth, white arrows and dug furrows. Scale bar = 250 mm. Image: nhm.ac.uk. This study has found evidence of cannibalistic behavior, such as human teeth marks on many bones. Researchers report that 15,000 in Britain was home to a complex culture for carving and butchering human remains. Silvia Bello (Lead researcher at Natural History Museum’s Department of Earth Sciences) said that the researchers found evidence of “a much greater degree of human modification” than previously thought. “We have radiocarbon dating to show the remains were probably deposited around 14,700 years before. Gough’s Cave: A Human skull-cup. Image: nhm.ac.uk. The evidence indicates that humans returned to this area for hunting and burial purposes. Magdalenians were a group of cultural foragers from southwest Europe who lived in Gough’s Cave years before the arrival of humans. The climate became warmer around 15,000 after the end of the last Ice Age, and they likely migrated from Belgium or the Netherlands to Britain. Other ancient locations in central and western Europe have also shown evidence of people eating one another as a part of an old mortuary tradition. This study indicates that cannibalism is part of a mortuary ritual that involved the ritual use and intensive consumption of bodies. Simon Parfitt from UCL’s Institute of Archerology said that Neanderthals ate their deceased children. Researchers at the University of Bordeaux, France, found evidence of this. One study showed that Neanderthals may have broken, beat or cut bones from their deceased companions. Neanderthals are a type of human from the genus Homo. Their DNA was 0 .12%. different from that of modern humans. An analysis of specimens found in France’s Poitou Charentes revealed that cuts were done shortly after the death of these individuals to remove limbs.
