3,000 Years Old, Sixty Headless Skeletons are discovered in Pacific Ocean Archipelago Vanuatu

It is  discoverd by a team of archaeologists,When they began excavating an old coral reef in Vanuatu in 2008 and 2009, they soon discovered it had served as a cemetery in ancient times. So far, 71 buried individuals have been recorded, giving new information on the islands’ inhabitants and their funeral rites.The local museum’s staff of the Vanuatu Culture Centre, a range of researchers, lead by Bedford and Matthew Spriggs from the Australian National University (ANU), forms an international and cross-disciplinary team, working to gather information about the Pacific islands’ inhabitants.

Mads Ravn, head of research at the University of Stavanger’s Museum of Archaeology in Norway says “This is a groundbreaking discovery, as it is the oldest and biggest skeleton find ever in the Pacific Ocean; bigger cemeteries found further east are much younger,”

Ravn suggests Relatives did not treat their dead gently. because besides being headless, some of them had had their arms and legs broken, in order to fit into the coral reef cavities. They may have been left to rot first and then buried later as skeletons.

Vanuatu is a nation of 83 islands,which is located 1,750 kilometres east of . The soil contains remnants from a violent volcano eruption,it is believed to have taken place exactly 3000 years ago. Scientists have found no sign of human activity predating this event.

Mads Ravn says “The way these people are buried, bears witness of a body concept which is different from the whole-body concept in Europe the last 5000 years,”

He adds “There was no sharp divide between life and death, and the dead were participating in the present. A few decades ago in Bali and other Pacific islands, people were putting their ancestors’ skulls on display in their homes.” This could explain that why the Vanuatu skeletons are headless. One skeleton was found with five skulls on his chest, and Ravn believes the heads may have been used in ancestral rituals.The islanders usually removed the volcanic ash before burying their dead under the ashes and sand.And each grave is marked with a pottery jar decorated with intricate patterns, which is possibly stamped by small pieces of worked bone. The ceramic also depicts faces and eyes, possibaly images of their ancestors.

Ravn says “I have never seen such beautiful artefacts before. These must be the world’s finest pottery jars of that age.”

Vanuatu’s first inhabitants most probably came from Taiwan and the Philippines, travelled thousands of miles by outrigger canoes equipped with sails which is big enough to contain large families. The canoers settled on the uninhabited islands, and started supporting themselves by fishing and cultivating the land. Giant tortoises were abundant and easy to catch. Volcanic ashes from 3000 years ago contain many tracks of tortoises, but these are entirely non-existent 100 years on.

Ravn says “It is very interesting to observe the consequences of human beings taking possession over virgin land.”

Skeletons’ DNA profiles should be ready later this winter, and the scientists are hoping to uncover kinship links among the dead. But there are already some findings of their health condition. As Ravn says “People were suffering from gout and caries — both diseases associated with the good life. But we can tell from our samples that the inhabitants were laborious and strong. They were simply genetically disposed to contracting gout from eating shellfish. And starch in food such as Taro and sweet potatoes induced caries.”

Tooth analyses has also revealed what these first islanders looked like. Ravn also says “They were most probably fair skinned of Asian origin, unlike the present day Melanesians, whose skin is dark. The original settlers probably travelled on, or mixed up with the Melanesians that arrived later,” and “But future DNA studies and isotopic analyses may later confirm that .”

The research project “Persistence and Transformation in Ancestral Oceanic Society: the archaeology of the first 1500 years in the Vanuatu archipelago” was started by Stuart Bedford and Matthew Spriggs in ANU in collaboration with the Vaunatu cultural Centre in Vanuatu and sponsored by the Australian Research Council. Its aim is to find out how Vanuatu was colonised and developed over time. Excavations will continue until 2012, expanding to different parts of Vanuatu over the coming years. Scientists are expecting to find more headless skeletons and other objects which may explain why colonisation took place