Archaeologists have analysed over 3000 human bones and bone fragments from the Early Bronze Age site of Charterhouse Warren, England, concluding that the people were massacred, butchered, and likely partly consumed by enemies as a means to dehumanise them. An accessible summary of the research is entitled, “Butchered bones suggest violent ‘othering’ of enemies in Bronze Age Britain“.

Well, we may have stopped nibbling on our enemies since then (to my knowledge), but otherwise, I am not sure that much has changed…

“We actually find more evidence for injuries to skeletons dating to the Neolithic period in Britain than the Early Bronze Age, so Charterhouse Warren stands out as something very unusual. It paints a considerably darker picture of the period than many would have expected.”
—Professor Rick Schulting, University of Oxford.