In 2010, during an excavation in the town of Imola, near the city of Bologna in northern Italy, archaeologists made an exceedingly unusual discovery. They found the 1,300-year-old remains of a woman, estimated to be between 25-35 years old, with a peculiar hole at the top of her skull, notably having undergone a phenomenon known as a “coffin birth”.
What is a “coffin birth”?
In the research documented with a photograph taken at the time of the tomb’s excavation, scientists noted the fetal skeleton was in a very unusual position. The baby’s head and body were between the mother’s thigh bones, while the leg bones remained within the pelvic cavity.
After a period of study, scientists concluded that the woman died while pregnant. She gave birth posthumously, after her death and burial, a phenomenon known as “coffin birth” or postmortem fetal extrusion.
What was the cause of death for the mother and the newborn child?
Archaeologists from the University of Ferrara and the University of Bologna have attempted to unravel the mystery behind the deaths of a mother and child in a new study published in the May 2018 issue of the journal World Neurosurgery. The researchers suggest that these particular remains may represent a medieval example of an ancient surgical practice known as trepanation. This procedure involved drilling or scraping a small hole in the patient’s skull to relieve pressure and treat various ailments. However, in this case, the surgery was unsuccessful.
“We hypothesize that the pregnant woman suffered from pre-eclampsia and was treated by drilling into the frontal bone to reduce intracranial pressure. Unfortunately, it seems that this method was ineffective, and the woman did not survive, resulting in her death along with the unborn child in her womb.”
Why does “coffin birth” occur?
All we know about what happens after death is the decomposition of tissues and cells in the body. This is key to understanding this mysterious phenomenon. As decomposition occurs, there is a rapid increase in the number of anaerobic bacteria, which reduces the amount of oxygen while leading to the accumulation of gases like carbon dioxide and methane.
These gases not only cause the body to swell but also act similarly to the factors leading to contractions before birth in a normal birthing process. As the volume of gases increases, they exert pressure, or rather create a force that pushes the fetus out of the mother’s body. Thus, this peculiar phenomenon known as “coffin birth” occurs during the body’s decomposition process.
Although not witnessed firsthand, scientists speculate that when the body of a pregnant woman decomposes, it generates gas that accumulates inside the abdominal cavity. This gas then creates pressure that pushes the fetus out.
However, the exact exit pathway of the child remains a question. Typically, a mother would deliver a baby through the vaginal canal. “But the cervix cannot dilate when the corpse has stiffened,” says Jen Gunter, a gynecologist. “I suspect what really happened is that pressure from the accumulated gas pushed the fetus through a tear in the uterus into the vagina, as the vagina is much thinner than the cervix.”
Regardless of how it happened, the child would have certainly been dead before it was ‘born’ in the coffin.
Cases of “post-mortem childbirth” have occurred before
In fact, history has recorded numerous instances of this strange and somewhat gruesome phenomenon.
In 1551, a Spanish woman was tortured and hanged, but four hours after her death, two babies were seen falling out of her abdomen. This is considered the first known case of post-mortem childbirth ever recorded in history.
In 2005, in Hamburg, Germany, the body of a woman who died from a heroin overdose was discovered in a state of decomposition. During the autopsy, rescue workers found the head and shoulders of a baby protruding from the woman’s vagina.
In 2008, in Panama, the decomposing body of a woman was found, and a decomposing fetus was later discovered in her underwear.
In 2013, a woman from Eritrea was migrating to Italy when the boat carrying her and others capsized. After her body was recovered, divers found a deceased fetus in her pants.
These chilling instances across history and continents reveal the unsettling yet fascinating phenomenon of postmortem birth, reminding us of the relentless and mysterious forces of nature that persist even in death.
