During excavations in the inner city of Gouda, 140 graves with skeletal remains of mainly elderly people and children were found. The excavation site used to be a cemetery for people who died of the plague.
A coffin containing multiple people was also found at the excavation site. The skeletal remains are in good condition, according to the municipality. The remains are being examined and then transferred to the municipal archaeological depot.
In the Agnietenstraat, where the find was made, the sewer is being replaced and the street is being renovated. First, archaeologists were given the opportunity to investigate. An area of 35 meters was excavated.
It was expected that a discovery would be made. “The Agnietenstraat and its surroundings have always played a major role in the history of Gouda,” the municipality writes.
Earlier, remains of the fourteenth-century city wall and various archaeological traces were found, such as the western moat of the large Maria Magdalenaklooster from the fifteenth or sixteenth century.
Hundreds of people buried in the seventeenth century
The buildings of the monastery were partly demolished and partly reused sometime in the sixteenth century. The buildings became the property of the city and ‘municipal institutions’ established themselves in them. For example, a plague house was set up in the Agnietenstraat.
Behind the plague house was a cemetery for victims of the plague. Hundreds of people were buried during epidemics in the seventeenth century. The plague hit particularly hard in 1625 and 1635. The cemetery was later partially cleared, but part of it remains.
Human bone material found during the research will be examined by the Leiden University Medical Center and Harvard University in the United States for DNA, as part of a research project on the plague. The results are expected in two years at the earliest.