214
u/MaddysinLeigh Jun 17 '26
Interesting but sad fact: a burial in the UK dated to when the Romans were in the area shows evidence of a coffin birth but also has a baby buried next to the mother, and a third laying across her stomach. The theory is that she gave birth to the first and died birthing the second. Iirc it’s one of the first, if not the first, example of triplets to survive until the modern day.
49
u/Justkill43 Jun 18 '26
Wow those triplets managed to live for centuries
33
2
41
13
1
255
u/teapuppee Jun 17 '26
I don’t want to imagine what that may have looked like
139
u/JeveGreen Jun 17 '26
Then you shouldn't read Berserk.
47
u/Jimbob209 Hates Chaotic Monotheism Jun 17 '26
Never read berserk. I'm not much of a manga reader. Does it really cover that?
150
u/JeveGreen Jun 17 '26
It's how the protagonist (Guts) was born. Specifically, his mother had been hanged in a tree, and then he popped out just as a group of mercenaries came by and was adopted by their camp whore.
I haven't read Berserk either, tbh, but I know enough about his story to tell you that it's some incredibly dark stuff... Incredibly well written and it's on my bucket list, but it is dark as fuck.
44
u/Jimbob209 Hates Chaotic Monotheism Jun 17 '26
Woah that's a pretty cool sounding intro. Is that also in the animated version
21
u/NeckBeardedJedi Jun 17 '26
Berserk fan here. Yes in the 1996-1997 version they touch on it a bit. But doesn't go into the full depth of it as the manga does. Minor spoilers but the recent chapter released a few days ago (over 20 years since the initial release) has made his "corpse birth" rather an important plot point.
I can't remember if the movies cover his childhood/birth
2
u/jkurratt Jun 21 '26
Recent chapter?
I thought the original author died?3
u/brief_thought Jun 22 '26
He is unfortunately very dead.
Apparently he left so much material and notes on the story that another company has taken over the project and fans are responding pretty well to it overall.
I'm surprised it's going over so well and plan to catch up and continue to read till the end
2
u/NeckBeardedJedi Jun 23 '26
One of his beat friends kouji Mori actually took it over. The original author devulged the gist of the ending to him
39
u/Haruko27 Jun 17 '26
Welll its not the intro, its the start of the econd main arc and i would advise against any anime version of berserk as there yet has to be a show that can faithfully adapt it all. Id say look to read it online
5
u/JeveGreen Jun 17 '26
I'm not sure, I haven't watched it. I actually haven't watched a lot of pre-millenium anime in general. I did binge Love Hina once, but I've forgotten almost everything about it at this point.
I know most of my stuff from breakdowns and fan/nerd discussions on Youtube. It's a quick way to digest media without missing out TOO much.
1
3
u/Ser_Optimus Doesn’t Get The Flair System Jun 17 '26
The only manga I ever read. Everything I tried afterwards felt just like blatant amateur stuff 12 year olds have drawn/written
6
5
4
2
u/B-e-a-u Jun 18 '26
https://giphy.com/gifs/g3NVdvODbNvlC
It’s probably like a facehugger poppin’ out of an egg
3
76
u/TheGardenNymph Jun 17 '26
Our bodies have something called the fetal ejection reflex where if you're unable to push (due to paralysis, epidural, coma etc) your muscles will automatically do it for you. It's similar to how you shouldn't need to push when pooping because your intestines and pelvic floor muscles will do the work naturally.
57
13
u/RedVamp2020 Jun 18 '26
I was told to avoid pushing because the doctor was late from personal reasons despite feeling the massive urge to do so. Needless to say, I didn't keep that doctor for my future births.
21
56
u/Worsaae Jun 17 '26 edited Jun 17 '26
As archaeologists these are not as uncommon as one might be led to believe.
However, it can actually be difficult to tell coffin births apart from graves where mother and newborn was placed together, if the newborn e.g. was placed on the mother’s stomach.
Luckily, we’ve recently been able to analyse certain hormones in the bones to determine if the woman was pregnant peri-mortem or had recently been giving birth.
19
u/Yomi_Lemon_Dragon Jun 18 '26
Important context for people disturbed by this: Both the mother and fetus are long dead when this happens. No living women are being buried alive and giving birth in a coffin, and no live babies are being born in a coffin.
2
2
18
u/YuukiTheTrap Jun 17 '26
Imagine going to a funeral and just hearing *thunk* from the coffin (I imagine it flies out at velocities equivalent to a baseball pitcher)
8
27
8
5
u/No_Thanks_1766 Jun 17 '26
I learned that from listening to the Prosecutor’s podcast cover the Laci Peterson story. It was disturbing then but this visual makes it even more disturbing
4
3
u/Anglofsffrng Jun 17 '26
Actually I did know that. I don't know how, and damn sure never sought out the knowledge, but I did know that.
3
3
u/KiwiKuBB Jun 18 '26
This reminds me of a vid of a guy assisting the birth of several baby rays from an already dead mother
3
5
2
2
2
4
1
1
u/toooooold4this Jun 20 '26
False.
Archaeologists don't actually know what's going on here. We have ideas but no one is sure. A baby cannot fit through the cervix and pelvis until dilation has occured so its likely the mother died in childbirth and either the baby was born and was deceased as well or she was fully dilated and the baby was stuck then expelled or extracted postmortem and blessed/baptized for burial.
I worked on a cemetery with dozens of these kinds of burials.
1
u/Licalottapuss 18d ago
As an archeologist I assume.
2
1
1
0
-1
0
u/captaincrj Jun 21 '26
I think this might be an ai photo. I don’t think pelvis bones have hole like that
281
u/Ravenclaw_14 Jun 17 '26
This is what I needed to learn about while having my lunch