At least 80 skeletons lie in a mass grave in an ancient Greek cemetery, their wrists clamped by iron shackles. They are the victims, say archaeologists, of a mass execution. But who they were, how they got there and why they appear to have been buried…

Archaeologists claim that they were the targets of a mass execution. But it is still unknown who they were, how they got there, and why they seem to have been buried with some care.

They were discovered earlier this year in a section of the Falyron Delta necropolis, a sizable ancient cemetery that was discovered while building a national opera theater and library between central Athens and the port of Piraeus.

But on a rare tour of the site, experts painstakingly showed Reuters the skeletons, some of which were stacked on top of one another with their limbs and legs twisted and their jaws hanging open in the dug-out sandy ground.

“They have all been put to death in the same way. However, they were buried with respect “The director of excavations, Dr. Stella Chryssoulaki, remarked.

“They are all tied at the hands with handcuffs and most of them are very very young and in a very good state of health when they were executed.”

The experts hope DNA testing and research by anthropologists will uncover exactly how the rows of people died. Whatever happened was violent – most had their arms bound above their heads, the wrists tied together