3rd-century-B.C. woman was buried facedown with a nail hole in her skull. Here's why.

 A new study investigating the unusual facedown burial of a woman from ancient Sardinia has revealed signs that she may have died from a fall during an epileptic seizure.

The strange facedown burial of a young woman, who likely had a nail driven into her skull around the time she died in Sardinia more than 2,000 years ago, could be the result of ancient beliefs about epilepsy, according to new research. The facedown burial may indicate that the individual suffered from a disease, while an unusual nail-shaped hole in the woman's skull may be the result of a remedy that sought to prevent epilepsy from spreading to others — a medical belief at the time, according to a study coming out in the April issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports(opens in new tab). Epilepsy is now known to be a brain condition that can't be transmitted to other people, but at the time the woman died, "The idea was that the disease that killed the person in the grave could be a problem for the entire community," said study co-author Dario D'Orlando(opens in new tab), an archaeologist and historian at the University of Cagliari in Sardinia. Read more...

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