By Tim Binnall
Archaeologists in Poland discovered a rather peculiar grave which contained the remains of a woman who was buried with a sickle propped across her neck presumably to prevent her from rising from the dead. The unsettling find was reportedly made by researchers from the Nicholas Copernicus University in Torun as they were excavating a 17th-century cemetery in the nearby village of Pien. In addition to the blade positioned across the woman's neck, those who buried her must have been particularly fearful of seeing her again in an undead form as she was also buried with a padlock attached to her toe.
Professor Dariusz Poliński, who led the research team which found the 'vampire,' explained that "the sickle was not laid flat but placed on the neck in such a way that if the deceased had tried to get up most likely the head would have been cut off or injured." While it is uncertain what, exactly, would have caused her contemporaries to suspect that she could come back from the dead, another intriguing detail of the woman's remains is that she was buried with a silk cap atop her head. Archaeologists say this suggest that she was of a high social status at the time of her passing, making her unusual grave all the more mysterious.