Human remains

Riamfada

Anyone have an idea of how fully decomposed human remains would affect the colour or composition of surrouning soil? Currently working through an East-West feature, 1.7m by .5m in a church yard but no visible remains.

Meathlass

Grimes wrote:

Anyone have an idea of how fully decomposed human remains would affect the colour or composition of surrouning soil? Currently working through an East-West feature, 1.7m by .5m in a church yard but no visible remains.

Just finished a similar site, no church but about 30 graves found. Very little human remains surviving, mostly just teeth and occasionally very crumbly bone which is going to be a nightmare to clean. It was very difficult to find the grave cuts and no discernible difference could be seen in soil colour or composition. If the soil is acidic you won't find anything. Your feature is probably a grave though.

sensitive_soul

Well.....there's a certain amount of minerals/metals in the human body as there is in soil..... perhaps it's just contamination from the decomposition and chemical reactions?

arctictree

Maybe stupid question but if you find any human remains, aren't you supposed to contact the Gardai - no matter how old you think they are?

Obviously, a supervised dig at a graveyard would be different....

Dr Strange

arctictree wrote:

Maybe stupid question but if you find any human remains, aren't you supposed to contact the Gardai - no matter how old you think they are?....

That is indeed correct. Many people (even gardai) forget that the coroner has to be informed about any human remains found and he/she will then determine (with the help of forensic pathologist/scientist/archaeologist) if the remains need to be examined by forensics or if they are a case for the archaeologists. The Coroner's Act overrides the National Monuments Act and until the coroner has decided what to do with the remains they fall under his/her authority.

Meathlass

Preusse wrote:

That is indeed correct. Many people (even gardai) forget that the coroner has to be informed about any human remains found and he/she will then determine (with the help of forensic pathologist/scientist/archaeologist) if the remains need to be examined by forensics or if they are a case for the archaeologists. The Coroner's Act overrides the National Monuments Act and until the coroner has decided what to do with the remains they fall under his/her authority.

Uusually on an archaeological site you would inform the local Gardai about the presence of human remains. Sometimes they come down just out of interest. Have never seen a corner on site. Most of the time you would know automatically that they are archaeological and not recent. I suppose if you are in any doubt you'd call the Gardai.

Dr Strange

Meathlass wrote:

Uusually on an archaeological site you would inform the local Gardai about the presence of human remains. Sometimes they come down just out of interest. Have never seen a corner on site. Most of the time you would know automatically that they are archaeological and not recent. I suppose if you are in any doubt you'd call the Gardai.

The Coroner does not usually go out onto any sites. They direct a professional to report back to them. Even though an archaeologist might know or presume the remains are historical it is up to the Coroner to first decide what is going to happen. That is particularly the case with the more experienced Coroners. If the Gardai do decide that the remains are of no forensic interest but fail to report the find to the Coroner then they are in breach of the Coroner's Act. If no Garda is available it is the responsibility of the person(s) who found the remains to report to the Coroner for that area. Reporting any human remains to the local Coroner is a legal obligation.

Degsy

You're probably aware of this but when they built the new library in Trinity College,hundreds of human bones were unearthed,many of which had been sawn into pieces.I remember seeing finger bones plainly visible in the spoil heaps.They reckon it was the old anatomy lab and the bones belonged to disected cadavers.

Dr Strange

Degsy wrote:

You're probably aware of this but when they built the new library in Trinity College,hundreds of human bones were unearthed,many of which had been sawn into pieces.I remember seeing finger bones plainly visible in the spoil heaps.They reckon it was the old anatomy lab and the bones belonged to disected cadavers.

Yes, I remember that. One curiosity that was also found was the skeleton, or at least some bones of the skeleton, of a camel if I remember correctly. The human bones were all from the old anatomy lab, as you said. Interesting find.

boneless

had to remove this on advice... sorry