“The undignified nature of the burial site along with the deadly wounds found on each individual suggests a catastrophic military confrontation, possibly followed by a hasty retreat,” he said.
A man works on the excavation of the Roman mass grave believed to contain the rare remains of Roman soldiers.Credit: AP
There are historical accounts of battles between Germanic tribes and the Romans on the border of the Roman Empire at the end of the first century, and the team called the grave the first physical evidence of such fighting in the area of modern-day Vienna. The remains could represent the start of the metropolis’s history, the team said — theorising that a Roman defeat could have led to the expansion of a small military base a few miles away.
“It suggests a concrete reason for the buildup of Vindobona into a full-scale legionary fortress, which would take us to the founding moment of Vienna,” Mosser said, referring to the military base.
The evidence astonished the team. Mosser said that before this evidence surfaced, no Roman evidence had been found in this area of the city. “Nor could we have expected a Roman battlefield to be located in the Vienna area,” he said.
The remains in the grave belonged to at least 129 people, archaeologists found, but the total number might exceed 150 as some bones were found intermixed.
General view on the excavation site in a Vienna football field.Credit: AP
All the dead examined so far were men, mostly between 20 and 30 years old, and many had suffered ghastly injuries, particularly to their skulls, torsos and pelvises.
Experts said the wounds seemed to be from weapons like spears, daggers, swords and iron bolts from ranged weapons, such as crossbows, which suggested the dead were not executed but had perished in battle.
The bodies appeared to have been buried hastily, with many found lying on their stomachs or sides with limbs intertwined.
They were most likely professional Roman soldiers, according to David Potter, a professor of Greek and Roman History at the University of Michigan who was not involved in the research.
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“I think we’ve got another moment reflecting a Roman defeat and a burial of troops after the fact,” he said, drawing parallels to how the bodies of Roman soldiers were handled after their forces suffered a brutal defeat at the hands of Germanic warriors in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in AD 9.
“You get a sense for the nature of battle from the injuries that these poor people have sustained,” he said. “The other side had a lot of big clubs.”
The team in Vienna said its experts were only beginning their research and that DNA analysis could provide more information about the origins and living conditions of the people buried in the grave. The museum’s report also laid out plans to look more into the objects found in the grave.
On a personal level, Mosser said the case struck a chord. “With so many young individuals buried so irreverently, one inevitably thinks about the horrific wars of the more recent past as well as the present,” he said. “The unfortunate conclusion: Humans have not become any wiser.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
