A centuries-old stone coffin discovered more than 150 years ago at London’s Westminster Abbey sparked a question that has persisted ever since: who is inside? Today, archaeologists have clues that point to a respected medieval figure who was not the original occupant of the tomb.
Previous research had determined that the sarcophagus dates from the Roman period, around the 4th century, and a three-line Latin inscription dedicates it “to the memory of Valerius Amandinus.” Given the high quality of the coffin, Amandinus was probably an important resident of London, but nothing is known of his life and deeds.
However, a late Anglo-Saxon cross carved on the lid of the sarcophagus and measuring 1.8 meters long was probably made at least 600 years later. The presence of the symbol has cast doubt on the age and identity of the skeleton inside, according to Warwick Rodwell, consulting archaeologist at Westminster Abbey.
He conducted a new analysis of the remains and discovered that the coffin’s occupant was likely a medieval monk or abbot of Westminster. Rodwell reported his findings October 20 in the Journal of the British Archaeological Association.
Workers first discovered the abbey burial in 1820. During the excavation, they broke the lid into six pieces and their rough handling damaged the skull. The bones were gathered into a pile and left in disarray, perhaps disturbed by looters while the lid was open. Then the coffin and its contents were reburied without being cataloged or studied.
The sarcophagus was “found” a second time in 1869 during a renovation project, and it was moved from the North Green region of the abbey to the East cloister. (Charles Dickens Jr., the famous novelist’s eldest son, wrote that he saw the sarcophagus at the abbey in 1879, according to the study.) It was then moved to the base of the abbey’s northwest tower, a task that took more than 36 hours due to the weight of the coffin.
Rodwell first learned of the coffin’s story in 2009. When he discovered that the sarcophagus was to be cleaned and preserved in 2016, in preparation for display in the new galleries being built in the abbey, he took the rare opportunity to revisit the mysterious burial.
“I saw this as an opportunity to take a fresh look and see what was inside – if anything – after 150 years of confinement,” he told CNN in an email.
Rodwell found that the bones were still mixed inside the coffin, which was carved from a single block of limestone and measured about 7 feet (2 meters) long, with walls about 4 inches (10 centimeters) thick on average. The skeleton was about 90 percent complete and the skull had been reconstructed when the coffin was last opened in 1869, he wrote in the study.
Analysis of the skeleton suggested it was a man who died between the ages of 35 and 49, and radiocarbon dating of the bones placed it between AD 987 and 1052. His teeth were in good condition. And although some of the bones showed signs of healed fractures, osteoarthritis and gout, there were no signs of serious illness or injury that could have caused the man’s death.
When researchers removed the skeleton and cleared the coffin of dirt and rubble, they were surprised to find a rectangular patch of lime, a compound believed to speed decomposition and trap “miasmas,” the so-called toxic vapors wrongly linked to disease. The shape of the lime stain suggests the body was in a rectangular wooden coffin that was then filled with lime before being placed in the sarcophagus, Rodwell said. “We didn’t suspect it and the wooden coffin was completely rotten.”
The practice of covering a body with lime was rare in the Middle Ages and usually reserved for high-ranking burials, he added.
This clue and the cross on the coffin led researchers to believe that the skeleton probably belonged to an important man, most likely the Abbot of Westminster. Two historically identified candidates came forward for this period: Ælfwig, abbot from AD 993 to around 1020, and Wulfnoth, who became abbot in 1020. Ælfwig is a slightly stronger candidate, according to the study, because he was known to have been a monk at Westminster before becoming abbot and therefore may have had a clearer connection to the Church.
“There was no clue,” Rodwell said. “It was about gathering and evaluating all the evidence. »
But why would the abbot of a prestigious church be buried in a used Roman coffin? Rodwell said it might actually be a tribute to his high status.
“By the end of the Saxon period, stone coffins were hard to find – the industry that made them had disappeared,” he said. “Acquiring a second-hand stone coffin was considered a ‘prize’.”
These coffins were so prized, he added, that in the 7th century, British monks from an abbey in Ely visited a Roman cemetery in Cambridge and dug up a stone coffin to take back with them to their deceased abbess, Æthelthryth.
Another example of a recycled stone coffin is the elaborate 4th-century sarcophagus currently housed in the Vatican Museums, rumored to contain the remains of Helen, mother of Emperor Constantine the Great, said Dr Simon Roffey, reader in medieval archeology at the University of Winchester in the UK. Carved with a military scene depicting Roman soldiers trampling barbarians, the coffin was probably intended for a man.
Nonetheless, more research is needed to fully explain the motivations and rationale for the reuse of pagan tombs and sarcophagi during the medieval Christian period, Roffey told CNN in an email. He was not involved in the new research.
Although Father Ælfwig is not exactly a well-known figure who looms large in the public imagination, the discovery nonetheless helped unravel a mystery that has stumped scholars since 1869 and fills an important gap in the Anglo-Saxon history of Westminster Abbey, “the most important church in Britain,” Rodwell said.
Mindy Weisberger is a science writer and media producer whose work has appeared in Live Science, Scientific American, and How It Works magazines. She is the author of “Rise of the Zombie Bugs: The Surprising Science of Parasitic Mind-Control” (Hopkins Press).
Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with information on fascinating discoveries, scientific advances and much more.
Gn world
