Overview
- The multidisciplinary reanalysis, published in Nature Human Behaviour by a team led by Linda Fibiger, examined remains excavated in the 1970s and curated in Novi Sad.
- The assemblage comprises 77 individuals dated to the early Iron Age, including 40 children under 12, 11 adolescents, and at least 21 adult women with very few adult men.
- Osteological evidence documents perimortem skull fractures from blunt blows alongside arrow or spear injuries consistent with swift, coordinated killing.
- Strontium isotope results and ancient DNA indicate most victims were unrelated and originated across the wider Carpathian–Pannonian region rather than a single community.
- Personal ornaments, pottery, 50–100 animal remains, and a covering mound signal deliberate deposition, shifting interpretation from epidemic or village raid to strategic, possibly ritualized violence, with archival records noting a similar nearby grave now lost.