Crossrail archaeologists have discovered a mass burial site in Farringdon, believed to be the final resting place of 14th century Black Death victims.
Thirteen skeletons, thought to be around 660 years old, were found laid out in rows 2.5 metres below the road that surrounds Charterhouse Square in central London.
Historical records reference a burial ground in the Farringdon area that opened during the Black Death Plague in 1348.
The limited written records also suggest up to 50,000 people may have been buried in less than three years in the make-shift cemetery, with the burial ground used up until the 1500s.
This is a highly significant discovery and at the moment we are left with many questions that we hope to answer.
The remains have been sent away for further tests but the hope is that they could help establish the exact cause of the Black Death plague which wiped out more than a third of England’s population in the 14th century.
Crossrail lead archaeologist Jay Carver said: “This is a highly-significant discovery and at the moment we are left with many questions that we hope to answer.
“We will be undertaking scientific tests on the skeletons over the coming months to establish their cause of death, whether they were plague victims from the 14th century or later London residents, how old they were and perhaps evidence of who they were. However, at this early stage, the depth of burials, the pottery found with the skeletons and the way the skeletons have been set out, all point towards this being part of the 14th century emergency burial ground.”
Experts linked the layout of the skeletons to the Black Death as they had been laid out in a similar formation as skeletons discovered in a Black Plague burial site in east Smithfield in the 1980s.
These are not the first skeletons found on the Crossrail project, with archaeologists already uncovering more than 300 burials at the New Cemetery near the site of the Bedlam Hospital at Liverpool Street from the 1500s to 1700s.
