A new study has unveiled that approximately 15,000 years ago in Europe, cannibalism was a common part of funeral rituals, driven by cultural factors rather than necessity.
Although earlier research had found evidence of gnawed bones and modified human skulls in Gough's Cave, England, this phenomenon was not isolated, as suggested by a study in Quaternary Science Reviews.
The study specifically examined the Magdalenian period, which occurred during the late Upper Paleolithic era, approximately 11,000 to 17,000 years ago. Researchers from London's National History Museum conducted a comprehensive review of literature, identifying 59 Magdalenian sites containing human remains, primarily in France, but also in Germany, Spain, Russia, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Portugal.
Among the 25 sites with interpretable funerary evidence, fifteen displayed indications of cannibalism. These signs included human remains with chew marks, skull bones bearing cut marks, and bones intentionally broken in a manner consistent with extracting bone marrow for sustenance. Furthermore, there were indications that, in some instances, human remains were mixed with those of animals.
The ritualistic manipulation of human remains and its prevalence across northern and western Europe strongly implied that cannibalism was a burial practice within Magdalenian culture, rather than a means to supplement their diet. The study emphasized that the frequency of cannibalistic occurrences among Magdalenian sites surpassed those among earlier or later hominin groups, highlighting that mortuary cannibalism was a method employed by Magdalenian people to handle their deceased.
