It was the year 2005. In the quiet village of Eulau in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, ordinary excavation was underway for the construction of a building and a canal.
While the large JCB machines were digging through the earth, a worker's eye suddenly fell upon some white shapes emerging from the depths of the soil. He first took them for stones and tried to push them aside, but on looking closer he was startled — they were not stones at all, but human skeletons! Not just one, but several skeletons, all intertwined with one another, were found there.
Work was halted and the local archaeological department was informed. Germany's renowned archaeologist Dr. Harald Meller and his research team arrived at the site. The situation was deeply astonishing, because these skeletons did not belong to any ordinary burial ground. They had been buried in a highly distorted and heart-wrenching state. Under Dr. Meller's direction, the archaeologists began removing the soil with great care, using brushes and small tools. After several days of arduous labor, a total of 4 mass graves were found, containing the skeletons of 13 people.
The most astonishing thing was that these 13 skeletons belonged only to women and small children. When grave number 902 was fully cleared, the eyes of every researcher present welled up with tears. There lay the skeleton of a woman who had drawn two small children into her embrace as if asleep. One of her hands rested beneath a child's head like a pillow.
When scientists conducted Radiocarbon Dating and DNA testing on these skeletons, it emerged that this event had occurred roughly 4,600 years ago — around 2600 BCE. At that time the people of the region were in the Stone Age. Researchers initially thought that perhaps some epidemic or natural disaster had caused these deaths. But when forensic anthropologists examined the bones and skulls under microscopes, a horrifying story of crime came to light. The research revealed that every woman in the group bore deep wounds on the head and body. One adult woman's skull had been completely shattered from behind — she had been mercilessly beaten to death from behind with some heavy stone or wooden weapon. The bones of the women's hands were also broken — meaning that as they were being attacked, they had raised their hands to protect their heads, and the attackers had ruthlessly smashed those hands. Not only the women — the skulls of children under 5 years of age accompanying them had also been crushed with stones. Inside the ribcage of one very small child, the tip of a flint arrowhead was found still lodged.
Scientists tried to understand the social conditions of that era through DNA and dental isotope analysis. What they found was among the strongest evidence of the status of women in ancient society and the atrocities inflicted upon them.
According to the research findings, in that society men remained in their birthplace, while women were brought in — purchased or married — from other regions. In scientific terms this is called Patrilocality, a practice that persists almost universally in human society even today. Yet even then, much as today, women in that group were always "outsiders," and their social protection was very limited.
In the mass grave found at Eulau village, there was no skeleton of any healthy or young man. From this it was surmised that when the men of the village had gone out to graze livestock or to hunt, some enemy group took advantage of that time and attacked the village. To wipe out the lineage of that society and to weaken the men, the enemies seized the women and children who were alone at home. They were subjected to atrocities and were then made to stand in a row and mercilessly killed by having their heads crushed with stones. When the men of the village returned, they found everything had ended, and with tear-filled eyes they buried their wives and children in that tender embrace in which they had been found.
This is not, however, the only ancient evidence that primitive man was as violent as today — many such examples exist. Like that heart-rending scene at Eulau, many such hair-raising incidents have come to light from various corners of the earth, staining humanity's past with blood.
In 1983, in Talheim, Germany, an ordinary man named Eberhard Erb was digging in his garden for some work. Suddenly his spade struck a bone. At first he thought it was an animal bone, but on digging further, human skulls began emerging one after another. The local archaeological department was informed, and when scientific excavation began under the leadership of Jörg Biel, a terrifying truth came to light. From beneath the soil emerged the skeletons of 34 men, women, and children. This event was around 7,000 years old. Scientists observed that most of the skulls had been mercilessly smashed from behind with stone axes. From this it was clearly surmised that perhaps at some point during the day, while these people were engaged in their own work, attackers had suddenly struck from behind and mercilessly wiped out an entire settlement.
In that same year, 1983, another discovery was made at Schletz near Asparn, Austria. During a survey of an ancient ditch, archaeologists were startled. When the renowned anthropologist Maria Teschler-Nicola and her team excavated there, they found the skeletons of over a hundred people, nearly 7,000 years old. The people of this village had dug a ditch around the village to protect themselves from enemies. But unfortunately, that very ditch became their final resting place. Here too, people had been beaten to death. But the most astonishing thing was that in this large mass grave, the skeletons of young women were almost entirely absent. From this, researchers drew a possible explanation — that after killing the village's men, elderly, and children, the attackers had perhaps abducted the young women and taken them away.
In 2012, during a routine survey near Lake Turkana in Kenya, Africa, archaeologist Dr. Marta Mirazón Lahr of Cambridge University and her team made a discovery that opened a very old and dark chapter of human history. The remains of a hunter-gatherer group of 27 people, roughly 10,000 years old, were found there. Of these, 12 skeletons were complete, and the hands of many appeared to have been bound. Arrows and stone blades were embedded in the bones, and the skulls bore deep wounds. Most distressing of all was that among the dead was a pregnant woman, who had been mercilessly killed. This event is regarded as the oldest and most robust evidence of prehistoric group violence.
In 2006, soil was being excavated in Germany for the construction of a new road. Right then, a mass grave roughly 7,000 years old came to light, containing the skeletons of 26 people. When Christian Meyer and his colleagues conducted research on this, the findings were bone-chilling. Here, people had not simply been killed — the leg bones of the deceased had been deliberately broken. This meant that the attackers had a savage tendency toward maiming or torturing their victims.
But it is not only Europe or Africa — evidence of this prehistoric violence exists in Asia as well.
Shimao, in China's Shaanxi province, is an ancient city about 4,000 years old. In 2012, when archaeologists excavated near the city wall there, they were astonished. Six large pits were found there, containing more than 80 buried heads — skulls — belonging solely to young women. Scientists surmise that these women were likely from an enemy group, and that during the construction of the city wall they were mercilessly beheaded and buried in the manner of human sacrifice.
All these events compel us to think that the violence and cruelty we witness in today's society is not merely a problem of the modern age. Even in the ancient Stone Age, man did not hesitate to shed the blood of fellow man for property, security, and pride.
Yet some say that on this earth, India alone was the sacred land of karma, while the rest of the world was a land of mere enjoyment. In India, they claim, people were noble and civilized (Aryan), while the rest of the world's people were uncivilized barbarians — and this, they argue, is why large mass graves have not been found in India. The skeletons found at Mohenjo-daro or in Roopkund Lake were at first thought to be evidence of massacre, but modern research has revealed that these were victims of disease or natural disaster. Hence some hold the view that, in the Indian context specifically, the Puranic accounts of the Satya Yuga and Treta Yuga are true, and that people then were not violent. But there is also evidence of how this claim is mistaken.
Roughly 11,000–12,000 years ago, a Mesolithic human community lived at a place called Sarai Nahar Rai, located in today's Pratapgarh district of Uttar Pradesh. During archaeological excavation there, along with numerous human skeletons, small stone tools — microliths — were found. In particular, evidence was found of a small stone point lodged within the ribcage of one individual's skeleton. This discovery suggests the possibility that the person had been struck by a projectile weapon, likely an arrow. Hence this find at Sarai Nahar Rai is regarded as one of the oldest and clearest archaeological pieces of evidence of prehistoric interpersonal violence in the Indian subcontinent.
Still, does the relative scarcity in India of evidence for prehistoric mass graves or widespread group violence — compared to other regions of the world — mean that Indians were not violent, or that human society in India was so advanced that such violence was less common?
Researchers have identified five main reasons for the absence of evidence of prehistoric mass graves in India.
First, India's climate is predominantly hot, humid, and monsoon-influenced. In the cold, icy regions of Europe or the dry deserts of the Middle East, bones can remain preserved for thousands of years. But India's soil has high acidity, and because of continual rainfall and flooding, skeletons or organic material buried underground decompose very quickly and merge into the soil.
Second, in India, from very ancient times, the practice of cremating the dead by fire, rather than burying them, became established. Cremation causes any marks of injury or evidence of violence on the bones to be lost in the ashes — something archaeologists find impossible to recover.
Furthermore, the Indian subcontinent is vast, and there was no shortage of forests and rivers here. Since population density in ancient times was low, the need for conflict between groups over land or food was less than in Europe. The Indus Valley Civilization, too, was primarily a trade-centered civilization. No large-scale weapons of war have been found there, which indicates that people were more focused on trade and commerce than on warfare.
Likewise, humans have continuously inhabited India's major river valleys for thousands of years. Because of generations of continuous farming, house-building, and the construction of new towns on the same sites, much ancient archaeological evidence buried underground has been permanently destroyed.
In Europe, over the last 150 years, very deep excavations have been carried out even at small sites using the most advanced technology. By comparison, India is so vast, and given the limitation of funding, excavation focused on prehistoric violence has not been carried out here on such a wide scale.
In other words, violence certainly existed in ancient India too, but for geographical and cultural reasons, evidence of it has not survived to this day. Therefore, the absence of evidence of prehistoric mass graves in India does not mean that violence did not exist here — rather, it means that the evidence has not survived, or has not yet been found.
So then — when we look back at the past, we imagine some fictional "Golden Age" or "Age of Truth" (Satya Yuga). We imagine that in ancient times humans lived in peace, in harmony with nature, and that it is only modernity that has filled us with greed, violence, and pride. But evolutionary biology and psychology entirely refute this notion of an "idealized primitive human." Nature is no peaceful garden — rather, it is a merciless battlefield. And man is the most fearsome predator on that battlefield.
If we study our nearest biological relatives, the chimpanzees, we see that they too form groups among themselves, stand guard to protect their territory, and, given the opportunity, attack and kill members of neighboring groups in a planned manner. The seed of this primal violence lies hidden in human DNA as well. Psychologists regard this as an inseparable part of human instinct. For the struggle to survive, for food, resources, and to propagate one's own lineage, violence was no crime for ancient man — rather, it was a "biological necessity" and the sole means of success.
A great question arises here: how can man become so cruel? How can a man who clutches his own group's child to his chest shoot an arrow at the child of another group? Psychology answers this through the process of "dehumanization." The human brain uses "mirror neurons" to feel the pain of another person. But when we label some group as "our enemy," "impure," or "barbaric," our prefrontal cortex shuts down that empathy. In ancient times, portraying another group as beasts or enemies was a common process, one that psychologically justified group massacre. It is because of this mindset that innocent women and children were always the ones subjected to the greatest atrocities.
Psychologists broadly divide violence into two categories: Reactive and Proactive. Other animals in nature engage only in reactive violence, out of fear or self-defense. But man is the only creature on earth who can plan for months with great care, lie in wait, watch for the right moment, and carry out premeditated violence.
The skeletons found at Nataruk in Kenya or at Shimao in China were not the result of sudden anger — they were the outcome of a deliberate, planned massacre. The development of human intelligence and language has given us not only art, science, and culture, but also the skill to organize hundreds of people together and orchestrate systematic killing.
It would therefore be foolish to think that ancient man was godlike, and that it was books, machinery, or circumstance that corrupted him in the modern age. The real truth is that man, from birth, is a fearsome creature prepared to fight for his own existence. But this does not mean our future is dark. From the ancient hunting man to the man of today, there has been no particular change at the physical or mental level. The brain within our skull is, even today, that same brain of the primitive Stone Age. And yet, today we do not witness bloody conflict to that same degree in daily life. We do not go about slaughtering the people of neighboring states. How has this become possible?
This change has not come about through any biological evolution — rather, it has come through our "capacity to construct imagined stories." We built beliefs, laws, and institutions that succeeded in restraining our bestial instincts. We created fictions like "nation," "law," "religion," and "human rights," and taught the whole of society to believe in them. Today, violence rests solely within the exclusive authority of the "state," which keeps individual or group conflict suppressed. Modern civilization and the rule of law are precisely that chain which binds the prehistoric assailant lurking within us.
There was never, on this earth, any Age of Truth or era of absolute peace. The foundation of every empire, every civilization, and every ancient village has been built upon someone's bones and blood. We are all the descendants of those victorious killers who, in ancient times, annihilated other groups in order to preserve their own existence.
Perhaps acknowledging this historical and psychological truth is the greatest maturity of the human race. Because although today we have built a world-spanning society, beneath this thin veneer of civilization, that Stone Age instinct still lies dormant. Whenever the social order weakens, that communal or group violence rears its head once again.
The history of man is not merely a history of violence — it is also the remarkable story of a ceaseless struggle against that primal savagery within, to build a peaceful society. Rather than turning the past into a heavenly tale, we must accept our dark past. Because until we recognize that ancient darkness within ourselves, we cannot build a bright and peaceful future.
References:
1.Haak, W. et al. (2008). Ancient DNA, Strontium isotopes, and osteological analyses shed light on social and kinship organization of the Later Stone Age. PNAS, 105(47), 18226–18231.
2.Price, T. D., Wahl, J., & Bentley, R. A. (2006). Isotopic Evidence for Mobility and Group Organization among Neolithic Farmers at Talheim, Germany, 5000 BC. European Journal of Archaeology, 9, 259–284.
3.Teschler-Nicola, M. et al. (1999). Evidence of genocide 7000 BP—Neolithic paradigm and geo-climatic reality. Collegium Antropologicum, 23(2), 437–450.
4.Meyer, C. et al. (2015). The massacre mass grave of Schöneck-Kilianstädten reveals new insights into collective violence in Early Neolithic Central Europe. PNAS.
5.Mirazón Lahr, M. et al. (2016). Inter-group violence among early Holocene hunter-gatherers of West Turkana, Kenya. Nature, 529, 394–398.
6.Chen, Z. et al. (2025). Ancient DNA from Shimao city records kinship practices in Neolithic China. Nature.
7.Keeley, L. H. (1996). War Before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful Savage. Oxford University Press.
8.Fry, D. P. (2006). The Human Potential for Peace. Oxford University Press.
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10.Kelly, R. C. (2000). Warless Societies and the Origin of War. University of Michigan Press.
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