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Roman dead baby 'brothel' mystery deepens


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To return to a topic previously discussed in the Baby deaths link to Roman 'brothel' in Buckinghamshire topic last year.

 

The BBC is a carrying a new article linked to the upcoming 'Digging for Britain' TV series which raises the possibility that with burials occuring over a 50 year period due to religious symbols also found could rather than a "brothel" suggest links to a mother goddess cult.

 

New research has cast doubt on the theory that 97 infants were killed at a Roman brothel in Buckinghamshire.

 

In 2008, the remains of the newborn babies were rediscovered packed in cigarette cases in a dusty museum storeroom by Dr Jill Eyers from Chiltern Archaeology.

 

They were excavated from the remains of a lavish Roman villa complex in Buckinghamshire almost 100 years earlier, but had remained hidden ever since.

 

The story caught the attention of the world's press last year as Dr Eyers suggested that the villa was operating as a brothel and its occupants committing infanticide to dispose of unwanted offspring.

 

...continued

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To return to a topic previously discussed in the Baby deaths link to Roman 'brothel' in Buckinghamshire topic last year.

 

The BBC is a carrying a new article linked to the upcoming 'Digging for Britain' TV series which raises the possibility that with burials occuring over a 50 year period due to religious symbols also found could rather than a "brothel" suggest links to a mother goddess cult.

 

New research has cast doubt on the theory that 97 infants were killed at a Roman brothel in Buckinghamshire.

 

In 2008, the remains of the newborn babies were rediscovered packed in cigarette cases in a dusty museum storeroom by Dr Jill Eyers from Chiltern Archaeology.

 

They were excavated from the remains of a lavish Roman villa complex in Buckinghamshire almost 100 years earlier, but had remained hidden ever since.

 

The story caught the attention of the world's press last year as Dr Eyers suggested that the villa was operating as a brothel and its occupants committing infanticide to dispose of unwanted offspring.

 

...continued

But temple prostitutes were a feature of many pagan temples. Or so I was told once by a bishop.

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But temple prostitutes were a feature of many pagan temples. Or so I was told once by a bishop.

Possibly in a very few temples in particular cultures but so far as I am aware not usually a feature of a 'mother goddess' or other cult site dedicated to health problems in the Roman period.

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