The babies of Roman prostitutes were regularly murdered by their mothers, archaeologists have found.
考古学家发现，罗马妓女的孩子通常被她们亲手杀死了。
A farmer's field in Hambleden, Buckinghamshire, yielded the grisly secret after a mass grave containing the remains of 97 babies - who all died around the same age - was uncovered.
在白金汉郡汗布尔登村庄一个农民的田间发现了一个埋有97名婴儿遗骸——差不多死于同一年龄——的大墓坑，向世人昭示了一个耸人听闻的惊天秘密。
Following a close study of the plot, experts have decided it was the site of an ancient brothel and terrible infanticides took place there.
随着这一事件的密切研究，专家已确认那里曾是一家古老的妓院，那里曾发生过可怕的杀婴行为。
The Yewden Villa excavations at Hambleden in 1912. Archaeologists at the site have found the remains of 97 babies they believe were killed by their prostitute mothers
1912年，汗布尔登村庄Yewden别墅的开挖现场。考古学家在现场发现了97名婴儿的遗骸，他们认为这些婴儿是身为妓女的母亲杀死的。
With little or no effective contraception available to the Romans, who also considered infanticide less shocking than it is today, they may have simply murdered the children as soon as they were born.
由于那时候的罗马人很少采用避孕措施或者缺乏有效的避孕措施，那时候的杀婴行为也不像今天这样骇人听闻，一等孩子降生，她们就杀死了这些婴儿。
Archaeologists say locals may have systematically killed and buried the helpless youngsters on the site.
考古学家说当地人可能系统地杀害并埋葬了这些无助的孩子。
Measurements of their bones at the site in Hambleden show all the babies died at around 40 weeks gestation, suggesting very soon after birth. If they had died from natural causes, they would have been different ages.
根据汗布尔登遗址骨头的测量发现，所有这些婴儿均死于40周妊娠期前后，也就是出生后不久。如果他们是死于自然原因，应该处于不同年龄层才对。
Archaeologist Dr Jill Eyers, who lives locally, has been interested in the site for many years. She put together a team to excavate the site and is writing a book about her findings.
住在当地的考古学家吉尔•艾尔斯博士已经关注这一遗址很多年了。她召集了一个团队对遗址进行开挖并把发现撰写进了书里。
She said: 'Re-finding the remains gave me nightmares for three nights.
她说：“这些遗骸的重现让我做了三夜的噩梦。
'It made me feel dreadful. I kept thinking about how the poor little things died. The human part of the tale is awful.
“它让我感到毛骨悚然。我一直在想这些可怜的小孩子是怎么死掉的。故事中人类的行为太残忍了。
‘There were equal numbers of girls and boys. Some of the babies were related as they showed a congenital bone defect on their knee bones, which is a very rare gene.
“男孩和女孩的遗骸一样多。一些孩子还是血脉相连的，因为他们的膝盖骨上都有一种先天性的骨质缺损，这种遗传基因是非常罕见的。
'It would account for the same woman or sisters giving birth to the children as a result of the brothel.'
“这就解释了深陷勾栏的同一个女人或同为姊妹的女人生下了这些孩子。”
One of the infant skeletons found during the dig. Scientists believe the site was used to dump the bodies of prostitutes' babies because of a lack of contraception
挖掘中发现的一例婴儿骨架。科学家认为该遗址地区由于缺乏避孕术习惯了抛弃妓女的孩子。
The Yewden villa at Hambleden was excavated 100 years ago and identified as a high status Roman settlement.
一百年前，汗布尔登的Yewden别墅被开挖了出来并被鉴定为一个高层罗马人的居留地。
It is now covered by a wheat field, but meticulous records were left by Alfred Heneage Cocks, a naturalist and archaeologist, who reported his findings in 1921.
如今麦田覆盖了这片遗址，但博物学者和考古学家阿尔弗雷德•赫尼奇•考克斯一丝不苟的记录遗留了下来。他在1921年对自己的发现进行了报道。
He gave precise locations for the infant bodies, which were hidden under walls or buried under courtyards close to each other.
他描述了这些婴儿遗骸的精确位置，或隐藏在墙根下，或掩埋在院子里，紧紧地靠着。
However, the matter was not investigated further until now. Cocks' original report was recently rediscovered, along with 300 boxes of photographs, artefacts, pottery and bones, at Buckinghamshire County Museum.
然而，关于该事件至今都没有展开进一步的调查。近来在白金汉郡博物馆里重新发现了考克斯先生报告的原稿，还有300箱照片、人工制品、陶器和骨骼。
Dr Eyers was suspicious that the infants were systematically killed because they were unwanted births - a suspicion which has been confirmed by Simon Mays, a palaeontologist who has spent the past year measuring the bones.
艾尔斯博士怀疑这些婴儿是被系统地杀害的，因为他们是多余的诞生物——这一怀疑已被古生物学家西蒙•梅斯证实，过去的一年里他一直在测量这些骨骼。
Distressing: Part of one of the baby's skulls which was found at the site
让人痛苦不已的照片：现场发现的一个婴儿的部分头骨
Dr Eyers said 'He proved without doubt that all the infants were new-born. They were all killed at birth and all at the gestation period of between 38 and 40 weeks.
艾尔斯博士说：“他确定无疑地证明了这些婴儿都是新生儿。他们都在出生时、38至40周妊娠期间被杀害了。
‘There are still little bits of the jigsaw to be pieced together. We want to see final figures of boys and girls and the relations to ascertain what sort of group we have here.
“现在还有一些碎片需要拼接起来。我们要看看男孩和女孩完整的样子以及他门之间的关系，从而确定他们究竟属于哪个群体。
‘We also found a family of five buried in a well. Did they die in a fire or were they murdered?
“我们还在水井中发现了一个五口之家的遗体。他们是死于火灾还是谋杀？
‘There is another site about a mile down the river which we know nothing about but I think there must be a connection.'
“河流下面约一米深处还有另一处遗址，虽然我们对它一无所知，但我想两个地方之间一定存在联系。”
The find has been compared to the discovery of the skeletons of 100 Roman- era babies in a sewer beneath a bath house in Ashkelon, southern Israel, in 1988.
有人把该发现与1988年以色列南部的发现进行了对比。当时，在阿什克伦（古巴基斯坦城市）一个澡堂下面的下水道里发现了100个罗马时期婴儿的骨架。
侵略者秘而不宣的杀戮和放荡文化
Ruling with an iron fist: A typical Roman soldier
铁拳统治：一个典型的罗马士兵
Nearly 2,000 years ago it was the Romans who were enjoying the pleasant climate and farming bountiful crops in this corner of south-east England.
约2,000年前，享受着英国东南一隅怡人的气候和丰盛的作物的是罗马人。
The nearest Roman town was St Albans - or Verulamium - a busy market on Watling Street with its own gladiator theatre.
最近的罗马城叫做圣奥尔本斯——或维鲁拉米恩——沃特林街道上一个繁忙的市场，拥有自己的角斗士剧院。
Life was tough, disease rife and hygiene for the poor dreadful, but the climate is thought to have been warmer than now, making farming easier.
当时的生活很艰难，疾病横行，穷人的卫生糟糕透顶，但那时的气候据说比现在温暖，农耕相对容易一些。
The Roman name for Hambleden is lost to antiquity but the people would have been a mixture of native Celts and Roman settlers, most of them farmers growing wheat and barley and a mixture of other crops.
汗布尔登的罗马名字在时间的流逝中遗失了，那时的人们应该是混居在一起的土著凯尔特人和罗马移民，大部分人都是种植小麦、大麦和杂种其他农作物的农民。
Living in houses made mostly of wood, some would have travelled the length of the empire in the army and settled in the fertile Thames Valley, but most would never have travelled any distance from home.
人们主要住在木制的房子里。一些人跟随军队游遍了整个帝国，而后定居在肥沃的泰晤士河谷，但大多数人从没有远离过家园。
Despite the bloody image of the Roman Empire, Britain was - especially in the south - a peaceful and prosperous place for most of the period of the occupation.
虽然罗马帝国的形象很血腥，占领期间的大部分时间里，英国——特别是南部——都是一个安宁且繁荣的地方。
Pottery found in Hambleden comes from modern-day Italy, France, Belgium and Germany, showing the trade which the Empire brought.
在汗布尔登发现的陶器来自于今天的意大利、法国、比利时和德国，表明（罗马）帝国带来了的贸易。
But it also brought a culture of debauchery and death - even to a tiny village near the Thames, or 'Tamesis' to the Romans - with gladiators a day's boat trip away in London ( Londinium), brothels, and unwanted babies left to die in the open.
但它同时也带来了放荡和杀戮的文化——即便是泰晤士（罗马人称作“Tamesis”）河畔一个很小的村庄——角斗士的船只整日在伦敦（Londinium）游逛，人们出入于妓院，意外生下的孩子被丢在野外死去。
The famously well-preserved remains at Pompeii revealed a city rife with brothels signposted with erotic frescoes tempting passers-by with phrases such as 'Hic habitat felicitas' (Here happiness resides) or 'Sum tua aere' (I am yours for money).
举世闻名保存完好的庞培遗址揭示了一个妓院风行的城市，路标上贴着色情的壁画，用露骨的措辞引诱着过客，如“Hic habitat felicitas”（极乐驻此地），“Sum tua aere”（有钱，我就是你的）等。
Unlikely as it seems, it is entirely possible that Hambleden could have supported a brothel, as it is so close to the Thames, a busy waterway bringing trade to and from London.
看似不可能，实际上完全可能的情形的是，汗布尔登开办了一家妓院，利用靠近泰晤士河的地理优势，繁忙的水路带来了来来往往穿梭于伦敦的贸易。
The two-storey building was a few hundred yards from the river, with plenty of signs of wealth in the coins and pottery found in the grounds.
这个两层楼房距离泰晤士河仅有几百码远，地下发掘出的硬币和陶器充分显示了它的财富。
The remains of writing tablets and stylae, used to write, were also found, telling of a place with extensive contact with the wider world.
还发现了写字用的书写板，说明与外部世界联系广泛。
Dr Simon Mays, a skeletal biologist at English Heritage, has examined the Hambleden Roman infant bones
英国遗产局的骨骼生物学家西蒙•梅斯博士仔细检查了汗布尔登罗马婴儿的骨骼
Literacy was a sign of affluence, and rich men and women were in frequent correspondence with each other.
读写能力是富足的一种象征，富家男女间保持着频繁的通信联系。
Correspondence found at Hadrian's Wall shows how they bickered over dinner parties, gossiped about friends and discussed fashion in notes to each other.
哈德良长城上发现的信件显示了通过便条他们是如何在晚宴派对上斗嘴的，如何谈论朋友八卦的，如何讨论时下风尚的。
What went on inside the Hambleden villa is, of course, a matter of conjecture. But there is little doubt that the find of so many babies' skeletons proves that Roman Britain shared another part of the empire's culture - infanticide.
当然了，汗布尔登里发生的这一切只是一种猜想。但发现的这么多婴儿骨架证实了罗马英国人传承了（罗马）帝国的另一文化——杀婴，这是难容质疑的。
Illegal today, it was the opposite for the Romans, with the law making a child under two entirely the property of its father, to be disposed of as he saw fit - and if it was deformed, it was compulsory to put it to death. A letter from a Roman citizen to his wife, dating from 1BC, demonstrates the casual nature with which infanticide was often viewed:
杀婴在今天是非法的，但在那时的罗马人中却是合法的。法律规定两岁以下的孩子完全属于父亲的财产，可以听凭父亲处置——法律强制杀掉畸形的孩子。公元前1年的一封罗马市民写给妻子的信件显示了人们谈论杀婴的随意和自然：
'I am still in Alexandria. ... I beg and plead with you to take care of our little child, and as soon as we receive wages, I will send them to you. In the meantime, if (good fortune to you!) you give birth, if it is a boy, let it live; if it is a girl, expose it.'
“我还在亚历山大……我乞求并恳求你照顾好我们的小宝宝，等发了工资，我就给你寄钱。还有啊，如果（祝你好运！）你生育了，要是男孩儿就养着，要是女孩儿扔掉算了。”
In 374 - after Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the empire - the practice was banned. The Romans may have done much for us - but they left a very dark secret in the Home Counties.
公元374年——康斯坦丁把基督教定为（罗马）帝国的官方宗教后——这一习惯遭到禁止。罗马人也许为我们做了很多好事——但他们留给英国伦敦周围诸郡的是一个非常黑暗的秘密。
【圣奥尔本斯】史可追溯至铁器时代，当时称为“Verlamion”，可能有“沼泽上方之地”之意。公元44年至45年，罗马帝国人占领此镇；50年，建维鲁拉米恩（Verulamium）。3世纪时，维鲁拉米恩易名为今名“圣奥尔本斯”以纪念罗马士兵圣奥尔本（St Alban）。当时的罗马帝国立定多神崇拜与帝国祭祀为国教，一度迫害基督徒，圣奥尔本因庇护基督徒而被斩首，是不列颠首位殉道的基督徒。
【哈德良长城】英国不列颠岛上的一条有名的古长城遗迹。是罗马帝国在占领不列颠时修建的，从建成后到弃守，它一直是罗马帝国的西北边界。哈德良长城包括城墙、瞭望塔、里堡和城堡等，完整地代表了罗马帝国时代的戍边系统。
【庞培古城】古罗马城市，它始建公元前8世纪，占地1.8平方公里，曾经繁华一时。公元79年8月，维苏威火山爆发，滚滚的岩浆埋葬了这座美丽的城市。1600多年后的1748年，这座古城才被发现。
