Gruesome discoveries which included 5,000-year-old skulls are to go on tour in Leicestershire (England). The grim finds were made by archaeologists during recent excavations of Watermead Country Park, near Syston. Scientists who carried out the tests also found evidence that the people may have met violent deaths - and it could emerge that the park was once holy ground where people were sacrificed.
     The display has three large panels which illustrate how archaeologists from the University of Leicester uncovered important prehistoric and Anglo-Saxon remains during early phases of gravel extraction within the park after two human skulls were discovered. Remains include a Bronze Age "burned-mound" complex, which may have been a cooking site, an early Anglo-Saxon foot bridge and prehistoric human and animal bones. Dr Patrick Clay, director of University of Leicester Archaeological Services, which made the finds, said: "It may well have been a site of some significance. It could have been holy ground where sacrificed people were put."
     The travelling display will open at Thurmaston library on September 4, then go on to Birstall and Syston. A larger, permanent exhibition at Charnwood Museum will display a selection of the finds from the site, including the two human skulls and a neck vertebra with knife cut marks.

Sources: This is Leicestershire, Leicester Mercury (18 August 2004)