The head archaeologist on the excavation told Insider that they have discovered the remains of what they believe to be a 17th-century "vampire" infant who was buried face down and padlocked to the ground in an effort to allay the villagers' anxieties that the child wouldn't rise from the dead.
Archeologists discovered the skeletal remains of what they believe to be a 17th-century "vampire child" in an unmarked Polish cemetery. Łukasz Czyżewski
The child's bone remains, which experts estimate to be between 5 and 7 years old, were found in an unmarked mass grave in the Polish hamlet of Pień, close to Ostromecko.
The "necropolis," which is Greek for "city of the dead," is also where archaeologists found a "vampire" woman who had been buried with a sickle laying across her neck and a padlock fastened to her big toe in case she tried to rise from the dead.
The two graves were discovered just two meters apart in the cemetery, which his team believes to be a makeshift graveyard for "the excluded," or those who were not welcome in Christian cemeteries for various reasons, according to archaeology professor Dariusz Poliński of Nicolaus Copernicus University, who oversaw both digs.
Triangular padlocks were attached to people’s feet to keep them tethered to the ground once buried, Poliński said. Magdalena Zagrodzka
About 100 graves have been discovered in the cemetery, according to Poliński and his team of researchers. Many of these graves exhibit unusual burial practices, including "anti-vampiric" strategies to prevent people from "coming back from the grave," such as triangular padlocks fastened to people's feet to keep them tethered to the ground, as well as proof that grave sites were disturbed or dug into after the initial burial.
A individual could have been interred in such a cemetery for a number of reasons, according to Poliński. The person might have had an illness or an uncommon physical condition that altered their appearance, or they might have displayed bizarre conduct that made others dread them while they were alive.
Through a translator, Poliński added, "It might have also been that someone died violently and unexpectedly in peculiar circumstances." "Sudden death was frequently regarded as something that people ought to fear."
Villagers in the seventeenth century were also prone to worry about drowned victims and unbaptized or unchristened youngsters being buried.
Archeologists also found a collection of loose bones near the child's gravesite, as well as a pregnant woman. Magdalena Zagrodzka
Near the child's tomb, according to Poliński, archaeologists also discovered a group of loose bones and a pregnant woman carrying a fetus estimated to be around 6 months old.
According to Insider's Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert and Marianne Guenot, Matteo Borrini, lead lecturer of forensic anthropology at Liverpool John Moore University, "vampire burials" were a regular practice throughout Christian Europe as early as the 14th century.
People used to link "vampiric" epidemics with periods of huge mortality that, though at the time unexplained, are now thought to have been pandemics or widespread poisonings. According to Borrini, the prevailing belief was that these "vampires" would hunt down and murder their family members first before turning on their neighbors and other villagers. This belief corresponded to how we currently understand the spread of infectious diseases.
