51 Headless Vikings Found in English Execution Pit?

Wow, what a grisly find.

National Geographic News

Naked, beheaded, and tangled, the bodies of 51 young men—their heads stacked neatly to the side—have been found in a thousand-year-old pit in southern England, according to carbon-dating results released earlier this month.

The mass burial took place at a time when the English were battling Viking invaders, say archaeologists who are now trying to verify the identity of the slain.

What a horrific scene that must have been 1,000 years ago.

The dead are thought to have been war captives, possibly Vikings, whose heads were hacked off with swords or axes, according to excavation leader David Score of Oxford Archaeology, an archaeological-services company.

It gets even more savage:

Many of the skeletons have deep cut marks to the skull and jaw as well as the neck. "The majority seem to have taken multiple blows," Score said.

The bodies show few signs of other trauma, suggesting the men were alive when beheaded.

That's not far from where I live, would love to go up and check it out. I've always thought if it were possible to make a decent living out of it (or I were a millionaire) I'd be an archaeologist!

Read the full article for the whole story, very interesting!

These things realy facinate me. archaeology would have been my second choice in a career. always seemed pretty interesting. as for the headless dead bodies...... Dosent look like much has changed in a thousand years.. pretty sad. only different people in a different location now..

S & F!

MessOnTheFED!

Seeing as the best way to ensure death is to cut someone's head off, I doubt that this will ever change...

The English were frequent victims of the vikings.

Apparently the group that caught the vikings thought they had a way to prevent them from coming back.

We'll never know what events preceded these executions, how the invaders were captured etc.

You just have to wonder what could have led up to this?

Love stuff like this. I know it's quite grizzly, but human history frequently is.

I love knowing that stuff like this has been going on on the very ground i walk upon, albeit millennia ago. So interesting.

Good to know some of our ancestors gave as good as they got. And that Britain is actually LESS violent now than it has been, despite what you read.

Although it seems a grisly way to die, I'd rather be beheaded than anything else, ... it seems more humane.

Sometimes the only thing worse than death, ... is the thought of death, to be on foreign soil, remembering everyone back home, .... knowing that your " end" awaits you.

reply to post by Wildbob77


How many Englishmen would it take to round up 51 Viking men?

Sounds like a crap joke but it really is a thought provoking question. Like you say, what lead up to this. Would make a good book or short story;

'The Fifty-One'

Those Vikings were a rough crowd.

I'm suprised they only found 51 of them.

Originally posted by IntastellaBurst


Although it seems a grisly way to die, I'd rather be beheaded than anything else, ... it seems more humane.

"Many of the skeletons have deep cut marks to the skull and jaw as well as the neck. "The majority seem to have taken multiple blows," Score said. "

I'm sorry but that doesn't sound very humane. It sounds like they had to hack some them multiple times to get the job done. Not as quick as some think.

The vikings were always ransacking churches if they were caught they met nasty deaths.There were reports of them being flayed alive.The last Viking invasion was 1066 at Stanford bridge.They came in 300 ships and King Harold sent them home in 23 before being killed at Hastings.

Just found a this photo....wow!

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/4df1faa98dc3.png[/atsimg]