Italian Plague Graves Found

Italian Plague Graves Found
Italian Plague Graves Found
Italian Plague Graves Found
Italian Plague Graves Found
Italian Plague Graves Found
Italian Plague Graves Found
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Italian Plague Graves Found
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Archaeologists work at a mass grave containing skeletons of victims of the bubonic plague on the island of Lazzaretto Vecchio, south of Italy's Venetian Lagoon.

"In the last three years we collected more than 1,500 corpses and 150 boxes of artifacts," Vincenzo Gobbo, an archaeologist at the University Ca' Foscari of Venice, told National Geographic News. "We estimate there are still thousands of skeletons buried beneath every meadow in Lazzaretto Vecchio."

Researchers from across Italy will study the remains to learn more about society and everyday life in medieval and Renaissance Venice.

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—Photograph courtesy Venice Water Authority - Consorzio Venezia Nuova Archive/Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities - NAUSICAA Archive
 

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