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| Skeletal Remains at Roopkund Lake Photo by Schwiki |
High in the Indian Himalayas lies a glacial lake known as
Roopkund Lake. This lake also goes by a descriptive epithet–Skeleton Lake, named so for its contents.
Skeleton Lake is more than 16,000 feet above sea level and it is nestled in a
valley with steep sides. No one lives there and there is strong evidence of how
simply passing through the area can be fatally dangerous.
In 1942, a forest guard stumbled across Skeleton
Lake. He saw something there of which some locals were aware, but of which the
Western world had never learned. At the shores of the lake, he saw numerous
human skeletons. During the thaw, it became apparent that there were many more
skeletons where those came from. This discovery sparked a race to find out from
whence the skeletons had come. The political and military climate of 1942 led
to the immediate assumption that the skeletons were related to the war.
However, it was soon revealed that these skeletons were much older than first assumed.
A study was done on Skeleton Lake's skeletons to see whom they
belonged to and how these people had died. The study was inconclusive, but it
did show that the skeletons did not date from modern times. They had been there
for a long time. There were more than 200 skeletons in and around skeleton lake
and perhaps more in the depths of the lake and beneath the soil, yet none of
these skeletons revealed their origins or cause of death initially. The typical
theories were postulated, of course. Perhaps they had died of a virulent
disease, famine, massacre or natural disaster. It was not until 2004 that a
viable cause was backed up by the study of the skeletons by scientists with
modern equipment and knowledge.
The Skeleton Lake skeletons were finally dated in 2004. They
date from roughly 850 A.D.E. They may have belonged to a group of travelers, as
evidenced by possessions found on the skeletons and the fact that there is no
evidence of a settlement. The reason they were traveling is unknown, though it could have been a religious pilgrimage. They were not necessarily traveling next
to or even very close to Roopkund. Their remains could have been pushed into the
valley by glacier movement.
Every skeleton of Skeleton Lake shares evidence of
intriguing injuries. They all have suffered blunt force trauma to the head and
shoulders. The wounds appear to have been inflicted by round objects. This is
most likely the cause of death. That does not sound like war, disease or
famine. The scientists concluded that the trauma was caused by an extreme
hailstorm.
The idea that so many people could be killed by a hailstorm
is a strange one. However, these people had nothing to protect them from such
weather. There is no shelter that could protect all of them near Roopkund. Of
course, that still begs the question, why are the wounds only about the head
and shoulders? Furthermore, it seems unlikely that none of them sought to
protect each other, therefore leaving some of the skeletons with few or no
wounds. These questions lead many to believe that the fate of these mysterious
skeletons is still open for debate and possible further study.
Sources
The Skeleton Lake of Roopkund, India, retrieved 5/24/11,
atlasobscura.com/place/the-skeleton-lake-of-roopkund-india
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