Overview
- An international team led by James Cook University and the Lao Department of Heritage fully excavated Jar 1 at Site 75 over three field seasons (2022–2024) and published the results in Antiquity on Wednesday, May 20, 2026.
- Radiocarbon dates from bone and tooth samples place repeated deposits in the jar between about 890 and 1160 CE, a span of roughly 270 years that the authors interpret as episodes of secondary interment.
- Excavators recovered densely packed human remains representing an estimated 37 individuals, including adults and children, consistent with the jar functioning as a collective ossuary rather than a primary grave.
- Grave goods recovered with the bones include 20 glass beads, pottery, a copper‑based bell and an iron knife, and compositional analysis traced some beads to South India and Mesopotamia, signalling long‑distance connections.
- The team plans detailed bioanthropological study and ancient DNA testing to assess kinship and population ties, a step that could reframe the site’s chronology from an assumed Iron Age origin toward a medieval mortuary practice and inform how common this ritual was across the Plain of Jars.