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posted by cmn32480 on Monday October 17 2016, @07:52AM   Printer-friendly
from the kids-are-like-veal dept.

About 15,000 years ago in Gough's Cave, near Bristol in the UK, a group of people ate parts of each other.

They de-fleshed and disarticulated the bones, then chewed and crushed them. They may also have cracked the bones to extract the marrow inside.

It was not only adults that showed signs of being eaten. A three-year-old child and two adolescents all had the tell-tale marks of being nibbled on.

Some of their skulls were even modified into ornaments called "skull cups", which may have been used to drink out of.

What was going on in Gough's Cave? Was this an example of human violence between rivals, a strange kind of ritual behaviour, or simply a desperate bid for survival?

Article: http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20161011-the-people-who-ate-each-other
Archived: https://archive.fo/JeZdl
Archived: https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20161011-the-people-who-ate-each-other


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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by tibman on Monday October 17 2016, @06:12PM

    by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Monday October 17 2016, @06:12PM (#415304)

    A few years ago i "rescued" a praying mantis before winter. She was huge and kept hanging out by the door and waving her arms at me as i went by. Had a nice big terrarium and fed her crickets from a nearby shop. She laid an eggcase and 30+ baby mantises came out. It was like highlander in there. Constant skirmishes, feints, retreats, ambushes. Everyone ate everyone. Normal food was plentiful too. They just had to kill or be killed. I bought a bunch of tiny terrariums and ended up with several adults that were released back into the wild. Felt like releasing a bunch of hyper-aggressive velociraptors into someone's cow pasture. All the other insects just hatching or coming out of hiding didn't stand a chance. The mother died just before the spring release (old age). Saving that one mantis resulted in the death of hundreds of crickets, dozens of baby mantises, and thousands of fruit flies. Reinforced to me that nature is brutal and scary. So if you see a "cute" mantis asking for a winter home.. just pass it by.

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