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A peradventure enslave woman may have been executed with a acute weapon in what is now the Papua state of Indonesia , a novel bailiwick find .

Only the skull of the victim is available for analysis , but it revealed that the woman was between 26 and 42 geezerhood old when she was killed .

The injuries on the skull of the woman examined using both digital and ultraviolet light photography.

The injuries on the skull of the woman examined using both digital and ultraviolet light photography.

" Multiple incisive force psychic trauma injuries were identified on the frontal , worldly , and occipital bones of the braincase , " the researchers save in a paper published Sept. 16 in theInternational Journal of Osteoarchaeology . The team used digital and ultraviolet photography to examine the injury on the skull .

The woman experience in what scholars call Indonesia ’s " colonial menses , " a time between the sixteenth and mid-20th one C when the area was keep in line by European powers . The skull was find on Biak Island in 1935 by scientist from Airlangga University in Indonesia . The yr and the word " Biak " ( which may refer to the Biak people ) is written on the skull , researchers note in the cogitation .

During the colonial catamenia , Europeans went on slave maraud and captured local people . The Dutch , who controlled Indonesia during much of this metre period , practiced   widespread enslavement .

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It ’s potential that the woman was kill as part of these raids , but " it is impossible to differentiate if the cranium analyzed in this study belonged to a victim of inter or intra - tribal warfare , or if they were shoot down as a slave " study lead authorRizky Sugianto Putri , a forensic anthropologist at Airlangga University , tell Live Science in an electronic mail .   " However , the writ of execution - way combat injury on the braincase support that the individual was kneel or sit down and was not able to defend themselves actively . "

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The squad note that female thaumaturgist known as " mon " were highly look for during raid . That raises the inquiry as to whether this woman could have been a magician .

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The identity of her killers is also ill-defined . " We do not know who obliterate her . However , the sharp - force harm wounds were consistent with a parang , a weapon commonly used by Papuan tribes in the colonial menstruation , " Sugianto Putri tell .

lilliputian research has been done on human remains in Indonesia that go steady to the colonial period . Putri hopes that this paper , and future enquiry , will drop more Light Within on how citizenry lived and died during this period .

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