Injuries found on ancient skull remains from Egypt’s earliest royal cemetery may support the long-debated idea of human sacrifice. A new study suggests that many people buried near the first kings died violent deaths at the dawn of the Egyptian state.
Roselyn A. Campbell, an anthropologist at Purdue University, reexamined 46 skulls from graves surrounding the royal funerary complexes at Umm el-Qaab in Abydos, in southern Egypt. She found signs of possibly deadly injuries that happened around the time of death in 18 of them, or 39%.
The graves date to Egypt’s First Dynasty, from about 3078 to 2900 B.C. Hundreds of court officials and craftspeople were buried around the tombs and ritual enclosures of the early rulers.
British archaeologist Flinders Petrie dug up the graves in the 1920s. He believed the dead had been killed to serve the king in the afterlife, but he reported no signs of injury. That gap fueled a century of debate over whether ancient Egypt practiced what experts call “retainer sacrifice.”
Ancient skull wounds point to sacrifice in Egypt, not burial damage
Campbell said the most common injuries were straight cracks across the top of the skull. She also found a few wounds from sharp objects, including one that pierced the side of a head and a chopping blow to the eye.
Campbell explained that Petrie likely saw the cracks but mistook them for damage from burial. He coated many skulls in paraffin wax to protect them during shipping, and he often applied it right around the fractures.
The type of injury also casts doubt on a popular theory. Egyptian art often shows the king striking enemies with a stone mace.
Campbell noted that maces usually leave dents in the skull, while simple cracks tend to come from flat, wide objects made of wood or other lighter materials. She added that these royal scenes show foreign enemies, not the king’s own court.
Buried alive claim questioned as researcher notes the study’s limits
Without surgery, bleeding inside the skull from such injuries would likely have been fatal, she wrote. Breaks above the “hat-brim” line also tend to come from deliberate blows rather than falls.
The study also questions Petrie’s claim that some victims were buried alive. Campbell said the body positions he described can be explained by natural shifting during decay. Small hand bones still in place suggest the graves were the bodies’ first resting place.
The research has limits. The skulls represent only 5% to 15% of those buried at each site, and Petrie reburied the rest of the skeletons together in one pit.
Campbell said the ancient skull evidence does not answer every question about sacrifice in early Egypt. But it shows the royal funeral rites were likely more varied than once believed, and she urged scholars to take a fresh look at old museum collections.
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