Willie R. Tubbs, FISM News
When one thinks of a cross, from a historical standpoint, it’s unlikely visions of East England spring to mind. Recently archaeologists in Great Britain discovered remains that show the ancient, torturous practice of crucifixion was used in what became the county of Cambridgeshire.
As detailed in the forthcoming January/February 2022 edition of British Archaeology, researchers unearthed the remains of a man believed to have been between 25 and 35 years old whose heel bone still bears the nail which would have been driven through his feet.
“Well, it’s the first time a skeleton has been excavated archaeologically that anyone has found a nail in, so it’s not the sort of thing you’re looking for,” David Ingham, a project manager of the company that conducted the excavation, told The Guardian. “We know a reasonable amount about crucifixion; how it was practiced and where it was practiced and when and so on from historical accounts. But it’s the first tangible evidence to actually see how it worked.”
Today, Cambridgeshire is known as an academic community. It is home to the world-renowned University of Cambridge. But, as a former part of the Roman empire, Great Britain faced the same brutal forms of justice as their distant neighbors in the Middle East.
For reasons lost to history, the man was executed between the years 130 and 360 A.D., at least 100 years after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
This discovery marks just the fourth excavation of a person believed to have died by means of crucifixion, and the second in Europe. Previous discoveries have been made in Egypt, Italy, and near Jerusalem.
Experts say discovering the remains of crucifixion victims is rare for two reasons. First, contrary to common belief, most crucifixions were carried out with rope rather than nails. Second, most people who were crucified did not receive a proper burial, or burial at all.
“It was usual practice to remove any nails after crucifixion for re-use, discard or as amulets, but in this case the nail had bent and become fixed in the bone,” reads the report in British Archaeology, which was co-authored by Ingham and Corinne Duhig.
Ingham and Duhig postulate the man could have been a slave, but stress it is impossible to say. Rome outlawed the crucifixion of its citizens in 212 A.D., but a slave could still have been sentenced to such a fate.
The duo adds, “there were also many exceptions to the ban (several crimes, including treason, are cited in texts) – or perhaps the practice persisted in this wild land at the edge of empire. And yet, his body went to someone who gave him a standard burial within one of the community’s cemeteries.”
The body was found near the village of Fenstanton, which sits upon ground that was once, researchers believe, a moderately sized and (for its time) industrialized Roman settlement that was large enough to have at least five cemeteries.