King Richard III’s body has been missing for several centuries now. Most historians figured the guy was buried near Leicester, England…somewhere. Nobody could figure out where the hell the body ended up after Henry VIII’s people lost the records showing the location of the remains.

Using other records of the day, archaeologists determined that the King’s remains were buried somewhere near the altar of the Grey Friars Church…

The very same Grey Friars Church that was about to become a parking lot.

After construction began and trenches were being dug for the new parking lot, things came to a screeching halt as workers found they’d unearthed a skeleton…a skeleton that had been there for a very long time.

Scientists and archaeologists descended on the future home of another forgettable strip mall to see if they could learn more about the skeleton who’d been chilling just a few feet below the surface of the area for what appeared to be several centuries.

After a lot of testing, retesting and verified tests….there was no doubt as to whose body this was.

Discovered last summer, this story has resurfaced (totally intentional pun) as the lab-coats have determined that this, in fact and without a doubt, King Richard III’s remains.

Makes you wonder what the hell’s under the nearest WalMart.

[Telegraph UK]

Clarence Bright passed away at 93 years of age and his corpse was being prepped for burial in his final resting place.

Key word in that last sentence? ‘Was’.

Just hours before being buried, the body of Clarence Bright went missing. After receiving tips from family members, authorities began searching for Clarence’s son, Vincent. Almost immediately their search turned up a van containing a casket but still no Clarence.

When authorities finally arrived at Vincent’s home, they also found out where Clarence had seemingly sauntered off to.

Vincent, who, according to his family, had extreme religious views, had taken his good ol’ Dad home, in a cliche’ rookie move put him in the freezer in the basement and was going to bring him back to life.

Authorities shook their heads, arrested him, plucked his dad-sicle from the freezer and slapped a $75,000 bond on him.

Wayne County Jail arraigned Vincent via video.

In an understatement to the media, Vincent Bright’s lawyer, Gerald Karafa said:

“It’s an unusual case. It’s not something you see every day.”

Obviously Gerald the lawyer isn’t a regular reader of WeirdThings.

[Associated Press]

It’s late. It’s dark. You’re out in a cemetery with a buddy looking to snag some swag off a couple corpses and hoist it on the local pawn shop in the morning.

You and your buddy unearth a casket, begin to pry it open and BLAM! You realize that something from inside the coffin has just shot you in the face!

Sounds like the opening scene of a Sam Raimi film. It’s not. It’s an absolutely real thing called a ‘grave gun’ or more commonly a ‘set gun’.

Originally the guns were used to protect a particular area around a campsite to prevent any kind of intruders from entering the camp. The gun’s business end was typically very wide and one to three trip-wires were then strung from the trigger of the gun and anchored at the other end to trees. When someone entering the area hit any of the trip-wires, the gun would fire effectively disabling hte intruder.

Around 1700, the original set-gun design went through a little redesign and began turning up inside the coffins of the more important individuals who’d died.

Once word spread about the ‘grave guns’ being inside random caskets? Grave robbing saw a drastic decline.

One of the last, and quite possibly, the most in your face version of the grave gun was created in the late 1880s. Called a ‘Coffin Torpedo’, the next-gen grave gun was basically a sawed-off shotgun attached to the underside of the coffin’s lid. Once you opened the casket to peer inside? SUPER-BLAM! as a sideways rain of 36-caliber lead balls raced to kiss your face.
[GUNS.COM]

Because death and urns with your loved one’s ashes aren’t surrounded by enough creepy stories, a fun company called Cremation Solutions has decided to knock the creep factor over the wall. How?

By using a 3D printer to create an amazingly creepy look-alike head of your loved one that contains said loved ones ashes.

No…really…This isn’t a fun, faux site put up as a joke. This is legit, kids. You can now sit home and stare lovingly at the lifeless eyes of a remains-stuffed replica head of your loved one. These things make great conversation pieces too!

Guest: “That’s interesting. Are you into cosmetology?”

You: “No. That’s my ex-wife.”

Fun, right?

Before you get excited and click that Paypal button, there are some things to consider. The head doesn’t come with hair. It can either be added digitally (we’re not really sure what that means…but we’re guessing it’ll end up a lot like putting hair on those little Lego figures) or you can purchase a wig. We’re also not sure about the following line:

The full sized personal urn can hold all the ashes of an adult. For holding just a portion of the ashes, we recommend the keepsake sized personal urns.

Does that mean mini versions of your loved ones are available? We’re not sure.

We’re also not sure we want to know.

Wait…did that thing just wink?
[Cremation Solutions]

During the excavation of an Anglo-Saxon cemetery in Cambridgeshire, archaeologists have discovered the last resting place of a woman and her….cow?

University students who uncovered the find first thought the animal was a horse since men and their horses, even though rare, have been discovered in the past.

Dr. Duncan Sayer, co-director of the excavation stated:

“Animal burials are extremely rare, anyway. There are only 31 horse burials in Britain and they are all with men. This is the first animal to be discovered with a woman from this period – the late fifth Century – and it’s really interesting that it’s a cow, a symbol of economic and domestic wealth and power. It’s also incredibly early to find any grave of a woman buried with such obvious wealth.”

From other trinkets found with these two interesting and apparent companions, it appears that these two may have been besties while alive.

“They would have wanted to give her something really important to show respect and they wouldn’t have done that for just anybody. That’s why we don’t find cows with burials,” she said. Dr Sayer added: “The cow burial is unique in Europe which makes this an incredibly exciting and important find. I don’t think I’ll find anything as significant as this again in my lifetime.”

Anyone else smell a potential animated feature in this story?

[Arbroath]

A tomb containing several Stone Age generations of human remains dating back up to 5,000 years, along with a few otter skeletons of the same era, have been located on an island in Northern Scotland. The Tomb of the Otters, signifies the most important neolithic find this region has seen in over 30 years.

So, why are there otter bones amongst the final resting place of so many humans? Apparently the tomb wasn’t used very often and someone forgot to close the door when they left.

“It suggests the tomb was not entirely sealed and that otters were trampling in and out a lot” throughout the tomb’s use, (county archaeologist for Orkney, Julie) Gibson said.

“For that to occur, you must think there was a gap of a year or two” between grave visits or burials.

The site was discovered when a resident attempted to level an area of his property to give himself a better ocean view. You know, to see the otters.

[Nat Geo]