LINCOLNSHIRE, ENGLAND—Lincolnshire Today reports that the remains of a medieval priest have been found near a hospital chapel altar at Thornton Abbey in the east of England by a team from the University of Sheffield. A gravestone identified him as Richard de W’Peton, who died on April 17, 1317. “After taking Richard’s skeleton back to the laboratory, despite poor preservation, we were able to establish Richard was around 35-45 years old at the time of his death and that he had stood around 5 feet, 4 inches tall,” said Emma Hook. Examination of his skeleton revealed that he had performed strenuous physical labor, and marks on his teeth suggest that he had experienced a period of malnutrition or illness during childhood. The research team also produced a 3-D scan of the priest’s skull, which detected a slight depression that may represent a well-healed wound from blunt-force trauma. Hugh Willmott added that the priest may have died of hunger during the Great Famine, which struck Europe between 1315 and 1317, after a period of heavy rains that caused widespread crop failures. To read more about medieval English archaeology, go to "Stronghold of the Kings in the North."
