Dozens of Naturally Preserved Brains Found in Spanish Civil War-Era Mass Grave

Dozens of Naturally Preserved Brains Found in Spanish Civil War-Era Mass Grave
One of the 45 brains saponified of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco, found in 2010 in a mass grave around the area known as La Pedraja, is shown at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 9, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
Reuters
7/12/2017
Updated:
7/12/2017

MADRID—Archaeologists excavating a mass grave from Spain’s 1936 to 1939 Civil War have found the naturally preserved brains of 45 people eight decades after they were shot and buried on a hillside in the northern province of Burgos.

Spain has hundreds of mass graves from the war and from ensuing decades of dictatorship under General Francisco Franco. Very few have been dug up due to a lack of funding and Spain’s “pact of forgetting” on its return to democracy in the 1970s.

The brains from some of the bodies in the La Pedraja grave were preserved by very specific environmental conditions after heavy rains seeped into bullet holes in their skulls. This “saponification” process turned them into a soap-like substance.

One of the 45 brains saponified of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco, found in 2010 in a mass grave around the area known as La Pedraja, is shown at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 8, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
One of the 45 brains saponified of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco, found in 2010 in a mass grave around the area known as La Pedraja, is shown at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 8, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)

A preserved heart has also been unearthed, an unprecedented finding, says forensic scientist Fernando Serrulla who worked on the dig and has published a study with details of the discovery.

“Naturally preserved brains are very rare,” Serrulla said. “There are only around 100 documented cases in the world.”

The brains are being kept in a laboratory in Galicia, northwestern Spain, where Serrulla works. Shrivelled, brown and with the ridges still showing, they form the largest collection of naturally preserved human brains in the world, he says.

Fernando Serrulla, a forensic anthropologist of the Aranzadi Science Society works at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 8, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
Fernando Serrulla, a forensic anthropologist of the Aranzadi Science Society works at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 8, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)

None of the preserved organs and only 16 of the 104 bodies dug up from the grave have been identified.

Rafael Martinez, the president of a socialist association killed by Franco’s supporters in 1936, was recently identified as one of the bodies in La Pedraja.

“If only those brains could tell of what happened there,” his grandson, Miguel Angel Martinez, said.

Miguel Angel Martinez, grandson of Rafael Martinez who is one of those were killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1936, poses next a mass grave in the area known as La Pedraja, Burgos, Spain, June 23, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
Miguel Angel Martinez, grandson of Rafael Martinez who is one of those were killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1936, poses next a mass grave in the area known as La Pedraja, Burgos, Spain, June 23, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
A portrait of Rafael Martinez (C), one of those were killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1936 in the area known as La Pedraja, is seen among other portraits at family home in Briviesca, Spain, June 23, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
A portrait of Rafael Martinez (C), one of those were killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1936 in the area known as La Pedraja, is seen among other portraits at family home in Briviesca, Spain, June 23, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
Recipients containing some of the 45 brains saponified of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco, are seen at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 8, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
Recipients containing some of the 45 brains saponified of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco, are seen at a laboratory in Verin, Spain, June 8, 2017. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
A mass grave were found in 2010 the remains of the bodies of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1936 is seen in the area known as La Pedraja, Burgos, Spain, June 23. (Reuters/Juan Medina)
A mass grave were found in 2010 the remains of the bodies of those killed by forces of the dictator Francisco Franco in 1936 is seen in the area known as La Pedraja, Burgos, Spain, June 23. (Reuters/Juan Medina)