'Vampire cemetery' discovered in Poland
AAP/EPA/ANDRZEJ
GRYGIEL, Yahoo! July 28, 2013, 11:16 am
Skeletons were discovered with the skulls placed between their legs. Photo: AAP/EPA/ANDRZEJ GRYGIEL
Workers at a roadway building site in Poland have unearthed a grisly find - skeletons in what archaeologists believe to be 'vampire graves'.
A team of historians discovered graves containing seven skeletons with their heads removed and placed between their legs.
Archaeologists said the bodies had been subject to a ritualised execution designed to ensure the dead stayed dead and wouldn't be able to rise from the grave to terrorise the living.
Archaeologists now believe that the bodies date from the 15th or 16th centuries, ABC News reports, when the fear of vampires was widespread in Eastern Europe.
An archaeologist works at the roadside site. Photo: AAP/EPA/ANDRZEJ GRYGIEL
Lukasz Obtulowicz, an archaeologist from the monument protection office in the nearby city of Katowice, said there were clear indications that this was the site of a vampire burial, noting that stones had been placed on the skulls.
"All this served to prevent the vampires from returning to life," he said in a television interview.
