Camino del Molino burial site. Credit: S. Díaz-Navarro

Nearly 5,000 years ago, respiratory infections, possibly including tuberculosis, were ravaging the children buried at Camino del Molino (CMOL), Spain. The massive circular burial cave carved into rock is Europe's largest Copper Age mass burial, containing over 1,300 individuals, and has been the subject of years of excavation and analysis.

Now, a new study published in the International Journal of Paleopathology reveals just how widespread these diseases were and how they left their mark on their bones.

Dated to the 3rd millennium BC, the burial site was repeatedly used for over 700 years, resulting in a mass of bones, including men, women, and children.…