Discovered Bog Bodies and Their Violent Past

Christine Boyd

11/14/2016

Discovered Bog Bodies and their Violent Past

In mostly northwestern Europe, bogs have been the final destination for thousands of deceased bodies for more than 10,000 years. Many of the remains found from these bodies are just broken body parts and bones. A lot of these remains date back to the Iron Age. During this period, Celtic tribes thought of bogs as very special settings, and they were used for a variety of religious rituals. Past scholars believe that there are a variety of reasons why bog bodies exist. Some may have been executed because they disobeyed the law. Others may have been victims of torture, or killed for religious sacrifices. Modern scholars are trying to re-evaluate the thoughts of past scholars. A bog body that may have seemed to be tortured to death could’ve actually died from natural causes. Since many of the deceased bodies found in bogs are extremely old, it’s difficult to discover the cause of death for each body (Lobel & Patel 2010:22-29).

The oldest bog body in Europe was found in County Laois, Ireland. This body was found in the Cashel Bog, and is called “Cashel Man”. This man seemed to have died a violent death, and was from the Early Bronze Age. Evidence shows that his spine was shattered. His arm was also broken, and his back had been hit numerous times with an ax. It’s believed that he was a human sacrifice. Sacrificing young men was a ritual connected to the Iron Age. The death of Cashel Man leads archeologist to believe that this ritual could’ve dated back to a much earlier time (Lobel 2014:28).

Some deceased bodies were thrown into bogs because they couldn’t be buried in the traditional way. An example of this can be seen with a woman who was thrown into the Great Bog of Ardee. The woman had committed suicide, and was denied a proper Christian burial because of her un-conventional death (Spindler et al. 2013:161). These are just a couple examples of the many bog bodies found in Ireland. Over eighty have been found in the past two centuries, including one called “Gallagh Man”. This man had deer skin and rods tied around his neck which showed signs of strangulation. His body was even held to the ground with wooden sticks, a practice thought to prevent a soul from leaving the body. Since there are signs of violence associated with his death, it’s believed that Gallagh Man may have been a criminal (Haughton 2006:186).

Later in 2003, two other bog bodies were found in Ireland just 25 miles apart from each other. They were called Oldcroghan Man and Clonycavan Man. Like Gallagh Man, they both appear to have been treated in a violent manner. Oldcroghan had severed nipples, stab wounds, and holes in his arms which rope went through. Clonycavan Man had a shattered skull, wounds all over his body, and also had cut nipples. Shockingly, his hands weren’t rough and he had nice nails. Cutting ones nipples had ritual significance at this time. Kissing a king’s nipples was a sign of submission, so cutting someone’s nipples off was a very degrading act (Haughton 2006:186-187).