Home · Science · Oct 5 archive
Skulls Reveal Evidence of Human Sacrifice in Ancient Egypt
Confirmed
In Short: Archaeologist Roselyn Campbell's reanalysis of skulls from the First Dynasty tombs in Abydos, southern Egypt, has revealed evidence of human sacrifice.
Archaeologist Roselyn Campbell has reanalyzed skulls from the First Dynasty tombs in Abydos, southern Egypt, and found evidence suggesting human sacrifice.
Campbell's study, published in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology, reassesses a collection of skulls excavated by British archaeologist Flinders Petrie in the 1920s.
The reanalysis found that 18 of the 46 skulls, or about 39 percent, showed signs of blunt force trauma, indicating potential human sacrifice.
Campbell noted that the debate over whether ancient Egyptians practiced retainer sacrifice is pertinent to her interests in understanding how societies define and accept violence.
She emphasized the importance of contextualizing legacy data, given the long history of European and colonial archaeology in Egypt.
Campbell's findings suggest that the people buried around Egypt's first kings may have been killed to serve them in the afterlife.
The tombs date back to about 5,000 years ago, when Egypt's first kings ruled the newly united country.
Campbell's study highlights the value of revisiting previous data with updated methods and knowledge, even for incomplete datasets.
The reanalysis also revealed injuries from sharp objects and a chopping wound to the eye on some skulls.
Campbell expressed interest in further analyzing the bodies of these individuals if resources were available.
She noted that the remains were treated casually, with the rest of the bones dumped in a mass grave.
What this adds
This report adds new details about the specific nature of the injuries found on the skulls, including linear fractures and injuries from sharp objects.
The findings add to the ongoing debate about the practice of retainer sacrifice in ancient Egypt and its implications for understanding ancient societies.
Background
Archaeologist Roselyn Campbell's reanalysis of skulls from the First Dynasty tombs in Abydos, southern Egypt, has revealed evidence of human sacrifice.
What's confirmed
- Archaeologist Flinders Petrie suspected a century ago that the people buried around Egypt's first kings were retainers, killed when the kings died, but he found no wounds to prove it.
- Most of the bodies from Petrie's digs at Abydos in Egypt went back into the ground, but he kept the skulls and sent some of them to the U.K. When Campbell looked again with current forensic techniques, 18 of the 46 showed fractures from around the time of death.
- The tombs date to about 5,000 years ago, when Egypt's first kings ruled the newly united country.
- Some of the skulls also showed injuries from something sharp, and one person had a chopping wound to the eye.
- Learn how modern forensics uncovered evidence that Egypt’s royal retainers may have been killed to serve their rulers in the afterlife.
- Roselyn Campbell wanted to see what modern forensics could make of the skulls he kept.
- Modern forensic methods revealed breaks from around the time of death in 18 of the 46 skulls he kept.
- “Retainer sacrifice is a type of human sacrifice where those close to a ruler are killed when the ruler dies,” Campbell explained.
- Campbell found that 18 of those 46 skulls, about 39%, carry breaks that happened around the time of death.
- “I was drawn to these retainers partly because, even though they were buried around royalty, they are mostly relegated to footnotes in the grander narrative,” Campbell said in a press release.
What's still developing
- “I’m interested in how we as human beings decide which types of violence are okay and which are not, and how we even define violence,” Campbell told Ars.
- “People tend to fall into one of two camps,” said Campbell.
- “At the time, it was very common to focus most of the attention on the skull, and part of that was because phrenology and similar ideas held sway,” said Campbell.
- But there is very little archaeological evidence available, given that many of the earliest Egyptian tombs were plundered and/or hastily excavated.
- The excavation revealed a primary burial accompanied by a deposit of bones and skulls without any anatomical relationship.
- The excavation team’s analysis suggests that the burial may have been part of funeral rites performed in the domestic units of the region, potentially involving the sacrifice of male members of the same family to celebrate the founding of a settlement.
- Archaeologists from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) have uncovered an offering of human sacrifices dating back to the pre-Hispanic era in the Mexican town of Pozo de Ibarra.
- The discovery occurred during the construction of a sewage network, revealing a burial site with a complex arrangement of human bones and skulls.
- Among the findings were femurs, tibias, ulnas, and at least seven complete skulls, all deliberately positioned or stacked atop one another.
- Some of the skulls displayed evidence of cranial modification, a practice common among Mesoamerican cultures for aesthetic and possibly social distinction purposes.
- It isn't clear how they were killed, but a mace, which Egyptian art often shows kings swinging at their foes, would be expected to leave depressed fractures, or dents in the bone, rather than the linear fractures Campbell found.
- “Each person among these hundreds of retainers had their own lives, loved ones, personalities, aches and pains, and daily routines,” she said.