Ragnar Lothbroke Was Here


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That’s the Lloyd’s bank coprolite: a genuine, preserved, 9th century viking poop.

This coprolite (human feces) was discovered in 1972 in York under what was to become a local bank. As such, it’s been named the Lloyds Bank coprolite, or more colloquially, the Lloyds Bank turd.

Paleoscatologists determined that the human who deposited this now-renowned, seven-inch specimen had a diet of meat and bread. Unfortunately for that poor, long-dead soul, they also had a handful of intestinal issues. The scat was scattered with Whipworm and Maw-worm eggs, which would have caused stomach aches and other more unfortunate gastrointestinal symptoms.

I didn’t even know that Maw-worms existed, so naturally I google image-searched. I do know that things under extreme enlargement are often cute (tardigrades) or horrifying (maw-worms) Whipworms are the more commonly known trichonosis parasites, for which poop is an important part of their life-cycle.

So, there you have it: a dump that is “precious as the crown jewels.”

 

Comments

  1. Pierce R. Butler says

    George Lucas, and Hollywood generally, have never had the tiniest clue of where to look for models for really scary mega-monsters.

  2. lochaber says

    as much as I may claim to be some sort of luddite towards some aspects of technology, I’m very fucking grateful for that magical combination of clean drinking water and effective sewage disposal systems…

    I’m sorta curious as to what specific environmental/geologic/whatever processes caused this to specific specimen to become a coprolite as opposed to just becoming part of the local humus, but… Then again, I’m just really glad this isn’t an issue I have to personally deal with.

    Wash your hands folk, Cook your food people, and for god’s sake, please orchestrate your latrines to be downhill from your wells.

  3. Jazzlet says

    lochaber @#2
    I think the process of conversion to coprolite rather than humus requires a dry place more than anything else. In the late eighties I lived in a house that had been renovated in one of the Callaghan’s Government’s ‘enveloping’ scheme for the renovation of terraces by local Councils. We took up some floor boards to install a bicycle pulley and found a coprolite, which must have been there for a maximum of ten years at that point. It was completely dry, but quite solid and didn’t smell at all, had we left it there I think it would have ended up like the example above.

  4. kestrel says

    It’s interesting how archaeology has come to appreciate such findings. People now sift for pollens too, to find out about the plants that were there at the time, and find out other tiny clues. Used to be people were just interested in digging up weapons, or gold. I think it’s great we can now figure out what sort of diet and parasites people had, as it leads to a bigger and fuller picture of the human past.

  5. says

    I don’t know about the coprolite, but I know they found a lot of very well preserved things from Viking York, including a thousand-year-old sock. I believe a lot of it comes from an environment like a peat bog; waterlogged with no oxygen at all.

    I, too, am super fucking grateful for clean drinking water and proper sewage disposal. It’s right up there with painkillers and anaethsthetic

  6. says

    I don’t know about the coprolite, but I know they found a lot of very well preserved things from Viking York, including a thousand-year-old sock. I believe a lot of it comes from an environment like a peat bog; waterlogged with no oxygen at all.

    I, too, am super fucking grateful for clean drinking water and proper sewage disposal. It’s right up there with painkillers and anaethsthetic

  7. says

    lochaber@#2:
    Wash your hands folk, Cook your food people, and for god’s sake, please orchestrate your latrines to be downhill from your wells.

    There’s a funny historical incident at the Battle of Balaclava: when the British troops set up, they (naturally) set up along a river, which gave them water for washing and – other things. Colin Campbell (an old campaigner and decidedly not a fool) set the Highland Brigades up, up-river from the British. When the cholera came it devastated the British troops but not the highlanders, who were in prime shape during the battle.

  8. says

    kestrel@#4:
    People now sift for pollens too, to find out about the plants that were there at the time, and find out other tiny clues. Used to be people were just interested in digging up weapons, or gold. I think it’s great we can now figure out what sort of diet and parasites people had, as it leads to a bigger and fuller picture of the human past.

    I also have great love for this stuff. It’s as though the past is a great big murder-mystery and new techniques for analyzing what happened come all the time.

    Have you seen the David Attenborough show about his piece of amber from when he was a child? It has an ant in it. So he took it and researchers were perfectly thrilled to have some million-year-old ant DNA (they have plenty, but having more is the point!) and some pollen from the hairs on its back, etc. It’s a fascinating episode, though dated.

  9. says

    Jazzlet@#3:
    We took up some floor boards to install a bicycle pulley and found a coprolite, which must have been there for a maximum of ten years at that point.

    I was going to say “someone was expressing something?” and then realized it was a double-entendre.

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