--- title: Why Did Cannibals Eat Other People? (Not For the Calories) description: A new archaeology study reveals that the ancient practice of eating people—cannibalism—was not terribly nutritious canonical: https://time.com/4728703/cannibalism-calories/ author: Jeffrey Kluger article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-04-06T21:35:32.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:42:02.080Z article:section: Science og:title: Why Did Cannibals Eat Other People? (Not For the Calories) og:description: A new study reveals that eating people is not terribly nutritious og:url: https://time.com/4728703/cannibalism-calories/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why Did Cannibals Eat Other People? (Not For the Calories) twitter:description: A new study reveals that eating people is not terribly nutritious twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Why Did Cannibals Eat Other People? (Hint: It's Not For the Calories) > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: August 2026. ## TIME Future Proof: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition Future Proof is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. Making sense of the climate and energy economy. Future Proof examines the forces transforming energy and climate, and what those changes mean for business, technology, policy and the global economy. 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Future Proof covers climate and energy as an economic and business story rather than only an environmental one. It publishes every Friday and is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who writes Future Proof? Justin Worland, a senior correspondent at TIME and an award-winning climate journalist, writes Future Proof. #### Is Future Proof free? Yes. Future Proof is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-futureproof-2026q3/newsletters?i=76d762ca-6531-4ed5-95a5-89b621391c81&cr=time-nl-futureproof-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Cannibalism at Jamestown: Listening to the Bones [Watch (HLS stream): Cannibalism at Jamestown: Listening to the Bones](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/DfpOXwc2.m3u8) (2:28)  _Published 2013-05-03. Archeologists discovered bones they say may prove that Jamestown settlers resorted to cannibalism in the brutal winter of 1609-1610._  by [Jeffrey Kluger](https://time.com/author/jeffrey-kluger/)  ## Jeffrey Kluger Editor at Large Apr 6, 2017 9:35 PM UTC  by [Jeffrey Kluger](https://time.com/author/jeffrey-kluger/)  ## Jeffrey Kluger Editor at Large Apr 6, 2017 9:35 PM UTC No matter how hungry you are, you’d be very unlikely to sit down to a piping hot bowl of Larry—or anyone else, for that matter. In other words, you wouldn’t eat another person. Cannibalism has existed throughout the long, strange arc of human history, but even on those occasions when it’s been justified—when the [Donner party](http://ideas.time.com/2012/06/07/are-we-too-comfortable-with-cannibalism/?iid=sr-link4) had a dinner party, say—we don’t much like to think about it. Anthropologists, however, find the topic of cannibalism irresistible. The part that intrigues them most is the why: What situations would impel otherwise sociable humans to turn Stu into stew, or Frank into furter? Now, James Cole, a senior lecturer in archaeology at the University of Brighton, may have an answer. In a new study published in [_Nature_](http://www.nature.com/articles/srep44707), Cole calculates the calorie content of nearly all edible parts of the human body—from loin to ribs to tender rump—and concludes that when people have eaten people, it usually hasn’t been for the nutrition. Most incidents of human cannibalism occurred during the Paleolithic period: roughly from 2.5 million to 10,000 years ago, a range that easily includes the first appearance to _Homo sapiens_. To the untrained eye, human remains are just human remains, and once the flesh is off the bone it’s impossible to determine if it decomposed or was devoured. Archaeologists, however, are experts at spotting the unlovely clues that a body became a meal, including parallel cut marks on bone; the absence of the base of the cranium, which would provide access to the brain; and jagged breakage or scorching of bones, both of which suggest attempts to get at the marrow. Relying on such anthropological forensics, scientists have discovered a handful of sites of where cannibalism unmistakably took place—many of them across ancient Europe—with as few as five and as many as 30 victims per site. To determine the reason behind the feasts, Cole began by analyzing existing data on the chemical composition of the human body, specifically on an adult, male human body weighing an average of 110 lbs (50 kg). That’s small by modern standards, but not by ancient ones; a single man would contain about 66 lbs (30 kg) of lean muscle mass. But he would be made of more than just his choice cuts; he’d also be stomach, heart, lungs, body fat and all of the offal humans regularly consume when it comes from other species. Adding that all up, one man would represent a walking grocery cart’s worth of 125,822 calories, 32,376 of which would be lean muscle. The thighs would be among the most nutrient-dense parts, packing in 13,354 calories; the upper arms would provide 7,451 calories; the brain and spinal cord 2,706, the liver 2,569 and the heart just 650.  All of that, however, would not last long—and here is where cannibalism becomes a bad survival strategy. Assuming a minimum daily requirement of 2,400 calories per adult, one anatomically modern human would provide barely half a day’s calorie needs for a tribe of 25\. For Neanderthals or for anatomically modern humans living in the Paleolithic era—when daily exertion was greater and calorie needs higher—a single human body would stretch for just a third of a day. Those slim rations compare miserably with other game that was at large at the time. A primitive cow provided 367,200 calories worth of lean muscle mass alone—ten times more than a human; a bison weighed in 612,000 muscle calories; a woolly rhinoceros offered 1.26 million; and the true prize, a woolly mammoth, meant 3.6 million calories of muscle. What’s more, a human being who has been designated as dinner usually does not give up easily. “The mental and physical effort to hunt a hominin would presumably be much greater,” Cole wrote in the study, “given the hominins’ ability to fight, run and think their way out of the hunt.” Prey animals, of course, put up a fight too, but not the kind a person can. If a good meal was not what ancient humans were after when they ate other ancient humans, what was? Cole concedes that the fossil record doesn’t hold many answers. In some cases, a famine or an emergency like the one the Donner party faced might indeed have been at play: meaning cannibalize or die. In others, it could have been ceremonial, as when the brains of relatives were eaten after death. In most cases, however, the reason might have been a primitive form of geopolitics. Then, as now, humans expanded their range by killing, and that leaves a lot of bodies behind. “It might be that once the kill has happened it would make sense to eat the flesh either as a waste not want not, or perhaps as a warning,” Cole wrote in an email to TIME. “In truth we will never really know the true motivations, and they may be different for each episode.” What happens in the Paleolithic, it seems, stays in the Paleolithic. ## Transcript [ MUSIC ] Scientists have found the strongest evidence yet that the colonists living in Jamestown, Virginia may have resorted to cannibalism. Times were tough in Jamestown in 1609 and 1610. If you can imagine, winter was coming, and supplies from England that were supposed to bring food and other materials never made it there. And relations with the local Powhatan Indians had gotten so bad that the few hundred settlers were actually hunkered down under a siege like situation in the fort. People have written that things got so bad that the settlers may have resorted to cannibalism. Researchers digging through a pile of debris in Jamestown found bones that really took them by surprise. There was two thirds of a skull, and part of a legbone that belonged to what they believe was a 14 year old girl. And the reason the skull surprised them was that it had some very unique marks on them. But how do you even know that cannibalism happened when you're looking at bones that are several hundred years old? Well, it helps if you're a forensic anthropologist. Like Douglas Owsley who works at the Smithsonian Institution and was involved interpreting the bones. What he saw was a skull that looked like nothing he had ever seen before. It had multiple knife marks and several large gashes to the front and back of the head that he believes were caused, by either a cleaver or a light weight hatchet. He also says there were signs that a sharp instrument was used to puncture part of the skull and pry it open. He told me that he believes that the 14 year old girl was already dead when this occurred because he also works with victims of modern day crimes. And he says that if she had been alive when this happened, that there would be a different pattern of marks on the bones. And even apart from the physical scars on the bones. He says that they can tell a fascinating story about this girl, and where she came from. For example, doing chemical analysis. He can tell that she was likely recently from England because she didn't show signs of having eaten the primarily corn based diet that was so prevalent in the colonies at the time. She also had high levels of nitrogen in her bones and that indicates that she may have been well off in England and had access to eating a lot of meat and protein. He is also doing additional tests to confirm this. There are no written records of Jane's presence in Jamestown, but her bones are telling a very interesting story about an important yet gruesome period in our history. [ MUSIC ] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4728703/cannibalism-calories/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4728703/cannibalism-calories/"},"headline":"Why Did Cannibals Eat Other People? 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