These handout images provided May 1, 2013 by the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, DC, shows four shallow chops (at top) to an incomplete skull (L) excavated at James Fort in Jamestown, Virginia, by William Kelso, chief archeologist at the Jamestown Rediscovery Project; and a forensic facial reconstruction (R) produced by StudioEIS of Brooklyn, New York in consultation with Smithsonian researchers based on human remains excavated in Jamestown. Early settlers resorted to cannibalism at Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in America, researchers said May 1, 2013 after unveiling forensic analysis on the bones of a 14-year-old girl. Facing a period of starvation in the winter of 1609-1610 when about 80 percent of the colonists died, some apparently tried to dig into the brain of a child who had already died, said anthropologists at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. The girl's skull showed signs of awkward attempts to extract the brain matter, said Douglas Owsley, the Smithsonian forensic anthropologist who analyzed the skull and tibia of the girl who came to Virginia from England. "The desperation and overwhelming circumstances faced by the James Fort colonists during the winter of 1609-1610 are reflected in the postmortem treatment of this girl's body," said Owsley.(AFP)

By REUTERS

Published Saturday, May 04, 2013

Starving Virginia settlers turned to cannibalism in 1609: study

Settlers at Virginia's Jamestown Colony resorted to cannibalism to survive the harsh winter of 1609, dismembering and consuming a 14-year-old English girl, the US Smithsonian Institution reported on Wednesday.

This is the first direct evidence of cannibalism at Jamestown, the oldest permanent English colony in the Americas, according to the Washington-based museum and research complex.

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