Aug 25, 2025 06:09 PM
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025...an-remains
EXCERPTS: “When it comes to human stuff, I’ll take anything, pretty much,” says Henry Scragg. “As long as it’s been ethically sourced, may I add.”
Speaking from his macabre curiosities shop in Essex in a recent YouTube interview, Scragg wears a shabby bowler hat, has tribal-style face tattoos and a ginger beard that descends into three pendulous dreadlocks.
[...] There is no suggestion the sale of these items is illegal, but experts, including Dame Sue Black, one of the UK’s leading forensic scientists, are calling for a crackdown on the trade in human remains.
They say the lack of regulation means much of the buying and selling of skulls and bones falls into a legal grey zone; and that the growing online market risks fuelling a new era of “body snatching”, with reports of bones being removed from crypts and graveyards in the UK and abroad.
“You’ve got people who are breaking into mausolea and who are taking remains away to sell them for people who think this is gothic, quaint [or] supernatural,” said Black, the president of St John’s College, Oxford. “If you can make the sale of a bird’s nest illegal, surely to goodness you can make the sale of a human body illegal. Having a necklace made out of somebody’s teeth isn’t acceptable to people.”
One problem, experts say, lies in how laws are applied. In the UK, desecrating a grave is an offence, but the remains are not technically property so they cannot legally be “owned” or “stolen”. This means it would not automatically be a crime to possess or sell historical human remains, even if they had been unlawfully exhumed.
“It’s gruesome,” said Black. “It’s why we say ‘Rest in peace.’ You don’t expect your body to be dug up and sold.”
Dr Trish Biers, from the department of anthropology at the University of Cambridge, coordinates a taskforce at the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO) that investigates the sale and trade of human remains. She said there had been a substantial increase in sales in the UK in recent years. In the past five years, the BABAO had blocked more than 200 sales, including from auction houses, shops and online sellers.
You can’t take photos of remains under 100 years old for medical research … but it’s OK to turn a child’s spine into a handbag handle
Dr Trish Biers
While the market has long been dominated by ex-medical skulls and former museum exhibits, Biers suggested there had been an increase in the sale of skulls described as “archaeological”, the appearance of which is consistent with having been excavated from the ground or exhumed from coffins.
“Social media has completely changed the market,” she said. “It’s not illegal and that’s the problem.” (MORE - details)
EXCERPTS: “When it comes to human stuff, I’ll take anything, pretty much,” says Henry Scragg. “As long as it’s been ethically sourced, may I add.”
Speaking from his macabre curiosities shop in Essex in a recent YouTube interview, Scragg wears a shabby bowler hat, has tribal-style face tattoos and a ginger beard that descends into three pendulous dreadlocks.
[...] There is no suggestion the sale of these items is illegal, but experts, including Dame Sue Black, one of the UK’s leading forensic scientists, are calling for a crackdown on the trade in human remains.
They say the lack of regulation means much of the buying and selling of skulls and bones falls into a legal grey zone; and that the growing online market risks fuelling a new era of “body snatching”, with reports of bones being removed from crypts and graveyards in the UK and abroad.
“You’ve got people who are breaking into mausolea and who are taking remains away to sell them for people who think this is gothic, quaint [or] supernatural,” said Black, the president of St John’s College, Oxford. “If you can make the sale of a bird’s nest illegal, surely to goodness you can make the sale of a human body illegal. Having a necklace made out of somebody’s teeth isn’t acceptable to people.”
One problem, experts say, lies in how laws are applied. In the UK, desecrating a grave is an offence, but the remains are not technically property so they cannot legally be “owned” or “stolen”. This means it would not automatically be a crime to possess or sell historical human remains, even if they had been unlawfully exhumed.
“It’s gruesome,” said Black. “It’s why we say ‘Rest in peace.’ You don’t expect your body to be dug up and sold.”
Dr Trish Biers, from the department of anthropology at the University of Cambridge, coordinates a taskforce at the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO) that investigates the sale and trade of human remains. She said there had been a substantial increase in sales in the UK in recent years. In the past five years, the BABAO had blocked more than 200 sales, including from auction houses, shops and online sellers.
You can’t take photos of remains under 100 years old for medical research … but it’s OK to turn a child’s spine into a handbag handle
Dr Trish Biers
While the market has long been dominated by ex-medical skulls and former museum exhibits, Biers suggested there had been an increase in the sale of skulls described as “archaeological”, the appearance of which is consistent with having been excavated from the ground or exhumed from coffins.
“Social media has completely changed the market,” she said. “It’s not illegal and that’s the problem.” (MORE - details)