POMMERŒUL, BELGIUM—Live Science reports that an international team of researchers led by Barbara Veselka of the Free University of Brussels has analyzed human remains recovered from an ancient cemetery in Belgium in the 1970s. The cemetery contained 76 cremation burials, and the skeletal remains of one person, which were found in a flexed position. The cremation burials were dated to the second and third centuries A.D., while a Roman-style bone pin recovered from the inhumation indicated that it also likely dated to the Roman era. Recent radiocarbon dating of the bones, however, revealed that they date to three different times in the Neolithic period, between 7000 and 3000 B.C. “It is likely that more than five individuals contributed to the ‘individual,’ but five were confirmed by DNA,” Veselka said. Meanwhile, genetic analysis and radiocarbon dating of the skull revealed that it belonged to a woman who lived between the third and fourth centuries A.D., and the bone pin discovered with the composite skeleton was radiocarbon dated to between A.D. 69 and 210. The researchers suggest that Romans using the cemetery may have accidently disturbed a Neolithic grave, added the skull and pin to complete it, and then reburied it. Or, the researchers surmise, Romans may have created the burial using scattered Neolithic bones at the site, adding a skull and the adornment. Read the original scholarly article about this research in Antiquity. To read about another discovery in Belgium, go to “Moving Day.”

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Source: archaeology.org