Alex's Historical Fiction

Roman decapitation theories

Gabriele asked about any theories for the Roman decapitatd burials. There are lots, including burial rites specific to soldiers stationed in York, local burial rites, pagan rites, gladiators, the lot. Not a lot of previous work seems to have been done on decapitated burials, so there's not much literature to consult on the subject.

Hopefully the theories will be in the BBC's Timewatch series on April 7th, with a feature in the Sunday Times on April 2nd. However, this remains to be seen, as we've been given all sort of dates, but those are the dates we're hoping for. The dp is agog to see the expert's scientific conclusions; he hasn't been told yet! Presumably, they might be able to give the origins of the skeletons. If they don't cover the actual decapitation theories in the programme or online newspaper, I'll jot them down here.

posted by Alex Bordessa @ Friday, March 10, 2006