New technology helps piece together story of York’s Roman ‘Gladiators’
Cutting edge genome technology, hailed as being the next step on from DNA analysis, has cast more light on a mystery that has perplexed archaeologists for more than a decade. The origins of a set of Roman-age decapitated bodies, found by York Archaeological Trust (YAT) at Driffield Terrace in the city, have been explored, revealing a Middle Eastern body alongside native Europeans.
Archaeologists have speculated that the skeletons belonged to gladiators, although they could also have been soldiers or criminals!* Several suffered perimortem decapitation and were all of a similar age –
