Graves of 'vampires' discovered in Poland were cholera victims

© PLOS One

Excavations of graves suggested the deaths of six occupants were likely to have been viewed with fear and suspicion.

When archaeologists discovered graves in Poland where the dead had been buried with sickles across their throats and rocks under their chins, they assumed the unfortunate victims were suspected vampires.

But a new study suggests they actually died of cholera, and villages were afraid they would rise from the dead, bringing the deadly disease back with them form the underworld.

In post-medieval northwestern Poland little was understood about how diseases spread and it was thought the first to die in deadly outbreaks would return from the dead as vampires.

So they were subjected to funerary rites involving traditional practices intended to prevent evil.

These rites occurred throughout the 17th and 18th centuries as cholera epidemics swept through Eastern Europe.

The unusual graves were among hundreds of normal burials.

Excavations of graves suggested the deaths of six occupants were likely to have been viewed with fear and suspicion and perhaps because they were seen as social outcasts.

Initially scientists thought they belonged to migrants but tests found they were locals who had been singled out for the special treatment in death.

The study published in the open-access journal tested permanent molars from 60 individuals, including the six "special" or deviant burials, using radiogenic strontium isotope ratios from archaeological dental enamel.

They then compared the results to strontium isotopes of local animals.

Results found that those in deviant burials seem to be a predominantly local population, with all individuals buried as potential vampires exhibiting local strontium isotope ratios.

Dr Lesley Gregoricka from University of South Alabama said: "People of the post-medieval period did not understand how disease was spread, and rather than a scientific explanation for these epidemics, cholera and the deaths that resulted from it were explained by the supernatural - in this case, vampires."