An archaeological dig at Gough’s Cave in southeastern England revealed human bones that are 15,000 or so years old. They showed evidence that they had been gnawed on, and skulls were turned into cups. For some time, archaeologists thought the scene was unique, but more and more sites along northern Europe have revealed that the practice of eating humans was quite widespread among the Magdalenian culture of the Upper Paleolithic era. These people were homo sapiens, and it appears that this cannibalism was a funerary practice, and not war tactic or a defense against starvation. To them, it was just what you did when someone died. At the same time, the Epigravettian culture, mostly in southern Europe, burned or buried their dead.
Genetic studies show that the Magdalenian culture didn't just switch to burying their dead, but were actually replaced by people of the Epigravettian culture. We don't yet know what kind of beliefs led to funerary cannibalism, and it's possible we may never know. Read about the ritual cannibalism of Stone Age Europe at the Natural History Museum. -via ScienceAlert
(Image credit: Ethan Doyle White)