‘Rare’ 1,100-year-old skeletons found at hotel in UK, photos show. ‘Huge surprise’
If you stand along the curve of a narrow street in Malmesbury, United Kingdom, you’ll face a pair of picturesque buildings. On the right is an imposing historic church. On the left is the Old Bell Hotel, an ivy-covered structure with an inviting air.
Underneath this hotel sat a “huge surprise.”
Archaeologists excavated part of the Old Bell Hotel grounds in 2023 ahead of a construction project, according to a news release from the hotel shared with McClatchy News on July 8. The hotel goes back to 1220 and is a recognized historic site.
During the excavation, archaeologists found 24 “rare” skeletons dating from roughly 1,300 to 1,100 years ago. Photos show a few of these ancient remains.
“The finds represent the first confirmed evidence of 7th–9th century AD activity in Malmesbury,” the project’s manager, Alex Thomson, said in the release. “It suggests that the burials were potentially associated with the early establishment of the (neighboring) Benedictine monastery, which is generally dated to the 7th century.”
“What we’ve got here is not a collection of the bodies of monks — it’s men, women and children,” Tony McAleavy, an expert on Malmesbury history, told the BBC. “It looks like we’ve found traces of the community of people (who) helped the monks here.”
“This discovery literally transforms our understanding of the birth of Malmesbury Abbey in the seventh and eighth centuries,” McAleavy said in the release.
“We knew from historical sources that the monastery was founded in that period but we never had solid evidence before this excavation,” Paulo Guarino, an archaeologist with Cotswold Archaeology who helped with the project, told the BBC.
“These finds were a huge surprise to us all,” Thomson said.
A hotel spokesperson described the 1,100-year-old skeletons as an “unusual and significant” discovery.
“We are thrilled about the findings being revealed today,” Kim and Whit Hanks, the hotel’s owners, said in the release.
The findings were announced as part of a month-long historical celebration. Malmesbury is a small town in southern England and a roughly 100-mile drive west from London.
This story was originally published July 8, 2024 at 2:48 PM with the headline "‘Rare’ 1,100-year-old skeletons found at hotel in UK, photos show. ‘Huge surprise’."
