A medieval warrior whose face was split open in one of Europe’s most gruesome battles has been brought back to life 660 years after his gruesome death in a stunning recreation.
Experts reconstructed the fighter’s face after his skull was recovered from a mass grave outside of Visby on the Swedish island of Gotland.
There in 1361 a Danish force of about 2,500 men, many of them experienced mercenaries, carried out a massacre.
A medieval warrior whose face was split open in one of Europe’s most gruesome battles has been brought back to life in a stunning recreation
The warrior’s mouth was shattered by an axe, with additional wounds above his left eye and left cheekbone likely inflicted by a polearm
The Battle of Visby
The Battle of Visby was fought on the island of Gotland in 1361 between the Danish king’s troops and the Gutnian peasants.
On July 22, 1,800 Gotland peasants were killed in a brutal clash with Danish troops under King Waldemar Atterdag.
He wanted to subjugate Gotland after conquering parts of Skåne and Öland.
He had now landed on the island with a professional army and was preparing to march on Visby.
Halfway there, in the marshes of Mästerby, the farmers of Gotland tried unsuccessfully to stop his advance.
Source: Historiska
They faced a rural militia of about 2,000 poorly armed peasants, at least a third of whom were minors or elderly, excavations suggest.
In the ensuing carnage, the defenders suffered some 1,800 dead.
Among them was the warrior whose mouth had been shattered by an axe, with additional wounds over the left eye and left cheekbone, probably inflicted by a polearm.
Now, Brazilian graphics expert Cicero Moraes has brought his features to life by importing his skull into a digital interface.
He said: “Once the skull was complete, a series of soft tissue thickness marks were placed across the skull.
“These markers roughly indicate the skin boundaries in some regions of the face.
“To complete the data, we imported a CT scan from a living donor and deformed the bones and soft tissue from the CT scan to match the approximated face.
“Once the basic face was defined, we completed the approximation and created the most scientific image in shades of grey, with the eyes closed and no hair.”
The skull itself provides an incomplete data set, so some aspects – like the size of the nose, mouth, and eyes – are projections based on statistical data.
Meanwhile, things like hair and skin tone are subjective.
Brazilian graphics expert Cicero Moraes brought his facial features to life by importing his skull into a digital interface
“Once the basic face was defined, we completed the approximation and created the most scientific image in gray tones, with the eyes closed and no hair,” Moraes said
But the end result is an approximation of what the warrior would have looked like at the time of his death.
Whether it was an ax blow that proved fatal is unknown.
Mr Moraes said: “It’s difficult to gauge this from the skull alone.
“But such an injury would certainly not be easy to deal with given the year and the reality of the time it was inflicted.”
For Mr. Moraes, the images bring home the reality of war.
“These images are quite impressive,” he said.
“Today there are several conflicts taking place in the world and we usually watch the scenes from afar without knowing what is happening to the combatants.
The end result is an approximation of what the warrior would have looked like at the time of his death. Whether it was an ax blow that proved fatal is unknown
The Battle of Visby was fought on the island of Gotland in 1361 between the Danish king’s troops and the Gutnian peasants
“Imagine what it is like for those who experience such violence.”
After the battle, the citizens of Visby – the island’s capital – surrendered to avoid further bloodshed. The victorious King Valdemar IV received a large ransom and claimed the island as part of his kingdom.
Both Sweden and Denmark continued to claim the island until 1645, after Denmark’s defeat in the Torstenson War, when the Second Treaty of Brömsebro was signed.
Five mass graves were eventually found outside Visby’s walls, with the first archaeological excavations in 1905 revealing that many of the dead were buried in their armour.
Mr. Moraes completed his reconstruction with a three-dimensional model of the skull provided by the Swedish History Museum in Stockholm.
He published his study in the 3D computer graphics journal OrtogOnLineMag.
RESEARCHERS RECONSTRUCT THE FACE OF A YOUTH WHO LIVED 9,000 YEARS AGO
The experts mark the features with small pencils along the skull
Scientists have reconstructed the face of a Mesolithic teenager named “Dawn” to show how humans lived around 7,000 BC.
To do this, the researchers made CT scans of the skull, which National Geographic says was discovered back in 1993 in the Teopetra Cave.
Then they used a 3D printer to make an exact replica based on the real measurements.
Sculptor Oscar Nilsson then placed pins along the face to show how thick their flesh was in certain regions and to depict the different features.
The process includes data from the skull along with information about the general population in the area at the time they lived.
The incredible new reconstruction was unveiled at the Acropolis Museum on Friday by a team of researchers from the University of Athens.