Overview
- This week researchers published a study reporting at least 16 burials in the Galería del Sílex, a cave in the Sierra de Atapuerca that was sealed after the Bronze Age.
- The assemblage is dominated by children: 11 individuals under six years old, three aged 7–9 and two adults, a pattern the team describes as an infant-focused necropolis.
- Radiocarbon and contextual analysis date the remains to about 5,000–4,500 years ago, placing the site in the Calcolithic or Copper Age transition to the Bronze Age.
- The cave’s long sealing preserved human bones, ceramics, animal remains and more than 50 rock-art panels, giving unusually complete context for funerary study.
- Authors say the find fills a gap in Iberian Calcolithic archaeology by providing direct evidence that very young children received distinct burial treatment and that childhood carried social and symbolic meaning in these communities.