Human bones, including several skulls and limb bones, were discovered at a construction site in the centre of Castres, in southern France, prompting an immediate halt to work and a police investigation.
Workers from ASPI 81, a company based in Lavaur, were digging a trench about 90 centimetres deep for an electrical network on Rue Blaveau when the first skull appeared. Laurent, the company’s director, said that nobody on site knew the history of the location, and that finding a skull was a shock. He added that the discovery came in the middle of the Jubillar case, a high-profile affair in which a man had recently confessed to burying a body, which made the moment all the more unsettling.
National police attended the scene quickly. Castres police commissioner Julie Birak said officers had to establish that the bones were old. The possibility of a recent criminal act was ruled out rapidly, she said, and the remains will be passed to an archaeological service for expert examination, including dating. The commissioner said the contextual explanations were satisfactory.
Workers uncovered multiple human remains, including leg bones, arm bones and several skulls, spread across a length of roughly two metres.
A monastery’s 150-year history
The site sits a few metres from a separate construction project where a retirement residence is being built on the grounds of the former Carmel of Castres. That proximity is seen as the most likely explanation for the find.
The Carmel was founded in 1864 and the Carmelite nuns lived there, in what had been the former Hotel Frascaty, until the monastery closed in 2012. Records show the first burial in the monastery vault took place in August 1871, and the nuns had a dedicated funerary space within their property.
The bones found on Rue Blaveau may therefore come from an old cemetery or vault connected to the Carmel. Archaeological investigations will be needed to confirm their origin and date.
