Once upon a time, a long time ago, the face of the European continent was not as we see it today. Britain was very closely linked with the European landmass. Over a thousand years, this connection was severed, and now we see modern Europe like today. However, recently, several ancient artefacts from back then have been discovered that tell a lot about the people who dwelled in those lands during the stone age.
One such area was the Doggerland, which was once between Netherlands and Britain. The lost treasures, like multiple barbed points made from bony structures, washed up near the Dutch beaches, confirm the same. These bony artefacts are assumed to be weapons that could have been used by the Mesolithic hunter and gatherers that lived more than 10,000 years ago.
As per the study published in the ‘Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports’ researchers agree that the discovery of the weapons or tools confirms that people during those times were also actively engaged in war or hunting. Also, the weapons showed signs of being repeated sharpening and that they were re-used time and again.
While digging into the details of the bones used for making weapons, the team discovered that apart from using bones of animals like ancient red deer, the ancient humans also used human bones to carve out barbed points.
The team also discovered that a large number of animal resources were exploited at the time – a magnitude several times higher than the number of hunter-gatherers available in Doggerland. Perhaps that is why most weapons discovered were derived from animal bones.
The team further added that using human bones for making the weapons could be because of some ritualistic reasons – where they could have believed that the human was transformed into a weapon and therefore remained immortal.
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