Nearly 20 years ago, researchers found the remains of an Iron Age woman in Scotland. Just recently, scientists using a bevy of new-school technology were able to understand some of the grisly stuff that happened to her after death. Her brain appears to have been removed, several of her bones were broken and sharpened, and then her body was carefully reassembled and buried.

Weird! But then again, so are most ancient funeral practices, as a new study published in Antiquity suggests the remains may reveal a funerary ritual historians didn’t even know existed until now.

The remains were first uncovered near Loch Borralie in northern Scotland in 1998. Archaeologists later excavated the site and found two people buried beneath a stone cairn: an adult woman and a teenage boy who lived roughly 2,000 years ago during the Iron Age.

For decades, they were just another pile of ancient bones. A thorough reanalysis of those bones, which included DNA analysis, isotope testing, and a whole host of modern forensic techniques, has given researchers a much clearer picture of what happened.

Scientists Reanalyzed Ancient Bones and Found Something Much Stranger Than Expected

The woman’s skull was covered in strange scrape marks and had suffered some damage near its base, suggesting to the researchers that someone deliberately scraped around in her skull after death. They think maybe her brain was removed, possibly part of some kind of ritual or an attempt to preserve the skull itself. Four of her long bones were also intentionally altered, either broken or carefully sharpened into tools or other objects of cultural significance.

The bones were then returned to their proper position before burial, with a level of care and precision that leads the researchers to believe it was an act of respect rather than desecration.

The teenage boy buried alongside her, meanwhile, showed no signs of modifications. DNA evidence suggests they were maternal second cousins, probably part of a wider network of coastal communities connected across Scotland and the Orkney Islands, hinting at a broad, interconnected network of Iron Age communities that shared beliefs and traditions.