A 1,000-YEAR-OLD secret has accidentally been unearthed by a French man wanting to renovate his cellar.
In the dirt beneath his house lie dozens of medieval skeletons across 38 graves and 10 sarcophagi.
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The macabre discovery, made in a neighbourhood in southern Paris, is hoped to shed light on the area’s former inhabitants and their medieval burial practices.
Experts have long known there to be an ancient cemetery in the area, having found several sarcophagi since the 19th century.
But this is the largest excavation the neighbourhood has seen, and is the only burial to be subject to scientific study.
The skeletons are to be analysed in a laboratory, where specialists will determine their sex, age and their living conditions.
The excavation was prompted when the man found remains of a skeleton as he carried out renovation work in his basement, which has four rooms and covers roughly 52 square metres.
The forgotten cemetery was used for seven centuries, between the 3rd and 10th century AD.
Experts found the graves arranged in parallel rows, which was common of the time.
During the Late Empire, at around 280 AD, the deceased were buried on their backs in a wooden casing and then placed in a deep pit.
The first burials in the newly-excavated cemetery date back to the end of Antiquity, an era that spanned the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages.
Experts say the discovery proves that funerals were held well before the construction of chapels and churches, which were beginning to be erected in the second half of the 3rd century AD.
But by the beginning of the Middle Ages in about 470 AD, funerary practices had evolved to include plaster sarcophagi in which bodies were buried.
These tombs, arranged in a spread fan-like shape, had no decorations, unlike the embellished sarcophagi of Ancient Egypt.
They all contained a single deceased person, whereas it was common to find several individual remains inside each burial chamber during the Middle Ages, also known as the famously miserable Dark Ages.
One of the sarcophagi found was topped by a block of soft, sculpted stone, which experts believe has a cross and rosette engraved on both sides.
These motifs are regularly present on plaster sarcophagi, according to experts, particularly in Christian places of worship.
Experts will study the position of the bones and tombs in the long-lost cemetery, to figure out just how it was made, how the dead were placed there and whether there were any reopenings.
Strange UK burials sites
Here are some of the weirdest…
Leicester car park: King Richard III’s remains
- In 2012, King Richard III’s skeleton was famously found under a Leicester car park.
- The corpse had a metal arrow in its back and severe trauma to its skull.
- The following February, lead archaeologist Richard Buckley, of the University of Leicester, said tests proved the remains were the king’s “beyond reasonable doubt”.
- Richard was killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485.
- His demise was dramatised by Shakespeare, who had the monarch calling out “a horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse” before he died on battlefield.
Dartmoor: Grave of ‘Bronze Age princess’
- Its beautiful moor attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors every year, but in 2011, remains thought to belong to a Bronze Age princess were discovered on Dartmoor.
- The bones – thought to date back over 4,000 years – were found in a peat bog on White Horse Hill alongside a number of remarkable items, including around 150 beads, an animal pelt, a delicate bracelet and a woven bag.
- The picturesque National Park’s archaeologists were stunned to uncover the grave, which was described at the time as one of the most significant historical finds ever at the site.
- It is speculated that the grave was that of a young, royal woman.
Rare Oxfordshire stream: 26 human skeletons
- A beautiful stream in Oxfordshire might look like an unlikely place to find 26 human skeletons – but that’s what happened recently near the precious Letcombe Brook.
- The skeletons, believed to be from the Iron Age and Roman periods, were discovered during a £14.5 million Thames Water project to ease pressure on the rare chalk stream.
- Archaeologists believe some may have been victims of ritual human sacrifice.
- The skeletons are thought to be about 3,000 years old.
- Evidence of dwellings, animal carcasses and household items, including pottery, cutting implements and a decorative comb, were also unearthed.
- Cotswold Archaeology removed the items for forensic examination, which meant Thames Water could start laying the six-kilometre pipe.
