Nicknamed “the lake of skeletons”, this archaeological place was discovered in 1942 by forest ranger Hari Kishan Madhwal. It is an inhospitable place, a glacial lake on the snow-capped peaks of the Himalayas, in the Nanda Devi National Park in India, at an altitude of 5,000 meters. But it is also a sanctuary of divinities and a place at the origin of legends and religious festivities.
After the discovery of hundreds of bodies, including men, women and children, around and inside Roopkund Lake, several teams of scientists began research to trace their origin and the cause of their death. First, in 1950, anthropologists visited the site and estimated that only one catastrophe would have struck this group of individuals. “ Roopkund Lake has long been the subject of speculation about who these people were, what brought them to Roopkund Lake and how they died “, explained Niraj Rai, of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Paleo Sciences in Lucknow, India, who studied the skeletons of Roopkund.
The “victims” of “skeleton lake”: a mystery that only grows
A team of scientists is trying to put an end to the mystery of Roopkund Lake once and for all. In 2019, after almost a decade of research, the scientists published their study in Nature Communications. But their results only complicate the enigma.
First, carbon-14 dating reveals that the bodies were nearly a millennium old between them. Indeed, the oldest date from the 6th century, others from the 10th century, and the least ancient from the 19th century. “ This discovery shows the power of radiocarbon dating, as the Roopkund Lake skeletons were previously assumed to be the result of a single catastrophic event said co-lead author Douglas J. Kennett of the University of California, Santa Barbara.
At the same time, scientists took DNA samples to study the genome of different bodies. The genome revealed that, among these bodies, there would be several distinct ethnicities: Indian, Eastern Mediterranean, particularly from present-day Crete and Greece, and an individual from Southeast Asia. “ We were extremely surprised by the genetics of the Roopkund skeletons. The presence of individuals with ancestors typically associated with the eastern Mediterranean suggests that Lake Roopkund was not only a site of local interest, but attracted visitors from around the world » said lead author Éadaoin Harney of Harvard University.
The isotopic reconstruction also showed that, among the victims of Indian origin from the “lake of skeletons”, the diets were very varied. This would be, according to the researchers, a genetic sign that they belonged to different socioeconomic groups.
Finally, no weapons, commercial goods or pathogens that could indicate that the victims died due to an epidemic were found at the site.
Since the publication of this study in 2019, there are no new clues to tell us what the fate experienced by the different ethnic groups at different times on this lake shrouded in mystery could have been.
Co-lead author David Reich of Harvard Medical School said: This study highlights the ability of biomolecular tools to provide unexpected information about our past “. The advancement of technological tools in archaeology, such as those used in this study, could indeed contribute significantly to revealing more keys to understanding the events that occurred to the victims of the lake of skeletons.
This article was originally published on 11/16/2023
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