Animal and human remains were excavated from a mustatil, an ancient desert monument believed to have been used for ritual practices in Saudi Arabia.
Archaeologists in Saudi Arabia have discovered ancient human remains buried near hundreds of scattered animal bones inside a 7,000-year-old desert monument, a ritual site used by a prehistoric cult.
The mustatils' builders were members of an unknown cult. As a change to the climate slowly transformed the land to desert, cult members likely gathered to protect it by sacrificing their cattle to unknown gods, researchers say. Now, a new mustatil excavation, detailed in a study published March 15 in the journal PLOS One, has revealed more details about the mystifying structures and their worshippers lost to time.
Mustatils vary in their appearance, but they are typically long rectangles formed from low rock walls around 4 feet high. Excavations have revealed complex structures inside some of the ruins, including interior walls and pillars that give way to central chambers possibly reserved for feasting and ritual sacrifices, Kennedy said. Worshippers entered the mustatils from one end and walked anywhere from 66 to 1,970 feet or more to the other, arriving at a rubble platform called the head.
"They would most probably have brought animals with them, potentially slaughtered them on-site, offered the horns and upper parts of the skull to a deity, while potentially feasting on the rest of the remains," Kennedy said."We can't be certain if the slaughter occurred on-site or somewhere else, as we haven't found the rest of the animal remains.
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