1,500-Year-Old Skeleton of Woman Wrapped in Chains Found in Jerusalem

Archaeologists digging near Jerusalem have uncovered a Byzantine-era grave, the contents of which seem disturbing at first, but fear not, for it is actually just super weird.

The grave dates back to the fifth century and contains the skeleton of a woman wrapped in chains. Seems like a person was bound and thrown into a shallow grave. Maybe a murder? Maybe they were thought to be demonically possessed, and the chains were meant to contain the evil spirit? But no. The truth of it is just plain odd.

Initially, archaeologists thought the body belonged to a man, which would fit with the lifestyle choice of the dead. You see, the person was an ascetic. Asceticism is a practice that involves denying physical and psychological desires to attain some kind of loftier spiritual ideal. It’s the underlying philosophy of a lot of religions but, in this case, taken to a bizarre extreme. The skeleton, it turned out, belonged to a woman, which is unusual since the use of chains is mostly documented among male ascetics.

The excavation took place at Khirbat el-Masani, a Byzantine monastery near Jerusalem. On the surface, a person wrapped in chains and thrown into a ditch might seem like a punishment, but the researchers say otherwise. They say the chains are there to purposefully limit a person’s mobility so they don’t have to deal with the pesky distraction of movement and can solely focus their mind and spirit on God.

The practice was common in the Roman empire once Christianity swept through around A.D. 380. Ascetics were often seen doing these kinds of extreme demonstrations of spiritual connection with God. Sometimes they wore big heavy chains; other times they lived on top of a pillar. You have to wonder if their version of God is worth believing in if that’s the kind of shit you have to do to make Him happy or get his attention.

The researchers were a little taken aback by the fact that this ascetic was female. It’s not that female ascetics didn’t exist, it’s just that they usually practiced less extreme forms of self-discipline. They prayed and meditated incessantly while also doing a lot of fasting. They rarely took it as far as the guys, who were a bunch of try-hards. This particular woman was just one of the guys, I guess.