A GRUESOME pit has been uncovered full of Stone Age human skeletons who met their end in brutal agony inflicted by their enemies.
Dozens of invaders were mercilessly tortured and mutilated after being captured in northeastern France more than 6,000 years ago.
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The group came to their doom at a time when warfare was widespread across the region.
But rather than kill their foes and be done with it, warriors held grim “victory” celebrations.
Some of the bodies had their left arms severed or hands completely dismembered, researchers say.
“The severed upper limbs would represent war trophies removed at the battle site following the violent encounter and then taken back to the settlement for perhaps further transformation and display,” experts wrote in the Science Advances journal.
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Others were believed to have been tortured before being murdered.
They had their lower limbs fractured to stop them from getting away after scientists found “blunt force traumas“, Dr Teresa Fernandez-Crespo, who worked on the findings told Live Science.
There are signs of piercing holes through their bones too which could mean that the victims were put out on display as a warning for all to see.
A total of 82 human skeletons were unearthed in the pits, dating back to between 4300 and 4150 B.C.
The tortured invaders may have come from around Paris, food evidence found on their teeth suggest.
However, there were chemical signatures from their remains that indicate the group may have moved around quite a bit too.
Some of the remains did not have signs they were mutilated, which could point toward warriors who didn’t survive when defending the area.
However, it all remains a theory for now.
Scientists say the skeletons could also be the result of “collective punishments or sacrifices of social outcasts“.
