The remains of a young child dating back hundreds of years were found padlocked to a 17th-century grave, an act thought to be linked to ancient fears of supernatural beings.
Archaeologists discovered the body of a child, believed to be aged six or seven, buried facedown with a triangular iron padlock located under one of the feet.
The body was positioned in such an unusual way likely to prevent the child from sitting up and leaving the grave to feed on the living, according to Professor Dariusz Polinski, a researcher on medieval burials at Nicolas Copernicus University in Toruń, central Poland.
Superstitious people would sometimes bury bodies facedown to make the deceased “bite into the ground and not harm the living”, the expert said.
These bones date back to an age when ghosts, zombies, vampires and other supernatural entities were considered as real as human beings.
Sometime after the burial, the grave was desecrated and all the bones of the child were removed, with the exception of the legs.
The remains were reportedly found in the village of Pień, located in south-eastern Poland, alongside those of 30 other people.
Last year, experts dug up the remains of a young woman from the same site, who was found with a sickle around her neck. It is believed to have been placed there to prevent her returning from the afterlife.
Speaking about the tool, Professor Polinski said: “The sickle was not laid flat but placed on the neck in such a way that if the deceased had tried to get up most likely the head would have been cut off or injured.”
Much like the child’s remains, she also had a triangular padlock on her foot – something symbolising the “closing of a stage and the impossibility of returning”, the expert added.
Shining a light on the site where the remains were found, Professor Polinski said: “This is a cemetery for rejected people, who were certainly feared after death, and perhaps also during life… who were suspected of having contacts with unclean forces, people who also behaved differently in some way.”
Speaking about the possible identity of the woman and child, the professor added: “These are people who, if it was done intentionally, were afraid of… contact with these people because they might bite, drink blood.”
To stop the dead from rising again from their graves, people living in the 17th century would often use stones, Professor Polinski also said, which have been found by scientists “on the elbow, on the larynx or on the neck” of the deceased among other places.
