Just outside the gates of the 4,000-year-old city in Chinaarchaeologists found a pit full of 80 skulls victims of human sacrifice. Now a new study has revealed a surprising fact about the victims: nine out of 10 were men.
In a study published November 26 in the journal NatureResearchers analyzed DNA collected from skeletons found in the ancient city of Simao and its satellite cities to reveal the social and kinship structure of this Neolithic society.
Archaeologists have also discovered two different forms of human sacrifice: one involving the heads of decapitated people buried in “skull pits” near the city gates; and another involving the burial of a person of lower status—usually a woman—as a sacrifice in the burial of a person of higher status.
In the new study, scientists used DNA analysis to find out the biological sex of skulls in a pit discovered under the foundations of Dongmen (East Gate) Simao.
“Unlike previous archaeological reports that identified these sacrifices as female,” the researchers wrote in the study, the new DNA results “revealed no evidence of female bias: 9 out of 10 victims were male.”
This find surprised archaeologists, because the sacrifices associated with elite burials in Simao and its satellite cities were predominantly female.
“These patterns of mostly female sacrifice stand in stark contrast to Dongmen, where beheadings and mass burials involved mostly men,” the researchers write. “This suggests that Shimao's sacrificial practices were highly structured, with gender roles tied to different ritual purposes and locations,” according to statement from the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Additionally, when the researchers examined the DNA of the sacrificial men, they found no differences in their ancestry compared to that of the elite tomb dwellers, meaning the sacrificial victims were not “outsiders.”
Although the reason for gender-specific sacrificial practices is still unclear, researchers have suggested some possible explanations.
According to the researchers, the sacrifices in the cemetery “may represent ancestor veneration, with women being sacrificed in honor of elite nobles or rulers,” while the sacrificed skulls in the pit “were likely associated with the ritual of building walls or gates.”
