A study described in the journal Antiquity on August 27, 2025 detailed an unusually well-preserved ornament made from beetle shells recovered from a child’s cremation urn in southwestern Poland, offering one of the few direct pieces of evidence for the use of insects in prehistoric ritual contexts in Europe, according to GEO France.
The Domasław cemetery, excavated between 2005 and 2007, was one of the largest Lusatian Urnfield culture sites and contained more than 800 cremation burials dating to about 850-400 BCE. One grave, cataloged as Grave 543, stood out for its depth and contents: a wooden burial chamber held three urns with the remains of a 9-10 year old child, an adult, and an unidentified individual. In Urn 1, which contained the child’s cremated remains, archaeologists also found sheep or goat bones, a bronze harp-shaped fibula, birch bark fragments, and dandelion pollen, reported Asriran.
The most striking find was 17 fragments from the outer shell of the green beetle Phyllobius viridicollis, 12 of which were complete pronota, the dorsal plates of the thorax. Several pronota were threaded on a blade of grass to form what appeared to be a necklace or symbolic ornament, placed in a corner of the vessel near the bronze fibula. The beetles’ heads, legs, and abdomens had been separated, indicating deliberate preparation for ornamentation. “The pronota from Grave 543 were probably strung as an ornament, but their function is more difficult to interpret. Perhaps they were part of the ornamentation of the birch bark vessel or the harp-shaped fibula. Or perhaps they were part of a necklace given in a birch bark vessel to the child buried in the urn,” said the researchers.
Preservation was aided by the corrosion of the bronze pin, which released copper compounds that permeated nearby organic material and stabilized the beetle shells. “They generally have a chance to survive only in particular environments like wet areas (e.g., bog bodies), or in association with metal objects,” said Dr. Agata Hałuszko, a researcher at the Institute of Archaeology of Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Poland and author of the study. Asriran reported that careful excavation and microscopic analysis then made study of the fragile artifact possible.
Seasonal clues emerged from the assemblage. Phyllobius viridicollis typically appeared in Europe from May to July, and the presence of dandelion pollen, which blooms from April to August, indicated that the child was likely buried in late spring or early summer. The timing suggested a possible link to an agricultural cycle or ritual calendar.
“The exact reason why the beetle was buried remains uncertain; however, the use of beetles as jewelry is not unknown,” said the archaeologists. Ethnographic accounts from the Hutsul people in Western Ukraine and Northern Romania described necklaces of shiny beetles made for the protection of girls; such necklaces generally included about 80 beetles and were meant to bring goods to those who wore them. Beetle wings were also used in Victorian-era jewelry and textiles and there has also been a recent find in South Korea of a 1,400-year-old Silla crown decorated with jewel beetle wings.
Beetle wings were valued for their luster and durability, sometimes on par with semi-precious stones. Insects often symbolized transformation and the transience of life, which could explain their inclusion in a child’s burial. The Domasław site represented an eastern expansion of the Hallstatt cultural tradition, named for an Austrian locality where more than 1,000 tombs with rich grave goods in ceramics, jewelry, textiles, and weapons were found.
The preparation of this article relied on a news-analysis system.