Across the globe, people indulge in all sorts of body modification—tattoos, piercings, scarification—and they usually have a say while they’re alive. Yet, after death, many ancient societies took a very different route, altering the dead for ritual, symbolic, or practical ends. These ten ancient practices reveal how the deceased were transformed long after their last breath.

10 Ancient Practices Explored

10. Skull Cups

Skull cups have been fashioned by countless cultures across many eras. The process involves extracting a cranium and carving it into a functional drinking vessel, typically focusing on the calvaria—the top portion of the skull. Decorative engravings are sometimes added for flair. The oldest known examples are a trio from Gough’s Cave in Somerset, England, dated to about 14,700 years ago, discovered alongside other human remains that appear to have been cracked open to harvest marrow.

Additional modified skulls that may have served as cups have surfaced in Nawinpukio, Peru (AD 400–700), and from the Bronze Age in El Mirador Cave, Spain. Systematic production of skull cups emerged during the Neolithic at Herxheim, Germany, while earlier examples appear from the Upper Paleolithic in Le Placard Cave, France. Vikings and Scythians are reported to have used defeated foes’ crania as cups, either to harness the dead’s power or to flaunt dominance. Historical accounts also note the Aghori of India and various Aboriginal groups in Australia, Fiji, and Oceania employing skulls as drinking tools.

Tibetan skull cups, called kapalas, were employed by Buddhists and Zoroastrians practicing sky burials—exposing bodies to birds, then pouring wine into the skull before offering it to the gods. Kapalas still appear on the market today, though their trade is heavily contested and banned in many jurisdictions.

9. Bones As Tools

In the ancient city of Teotihuacan, Mexico, a pre‑Aztec community fashioned a plethora of everyday objects—buttons, combs, needles, spatulas—from freshly deceased human bones between AD 200 and 400. They worked with femurs, tibiae, and skulls, using stone implements to strip flesh and shape the tools, a process that had to begin shortly after death before the bones grew too brittle. All discovered tools derive from local young adults; none were fashioned from foreigners, children, or the elderly.

A Neanderthal femur, at least 50,000 years old, was also repurposed as a tool, found alongside other Neanderthal remains near the Voultron River in France and used to sharpen stone implements.

8. Bones As Jewelry

Human bones have long been transformed into ornaments. Around 3500 BC in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, cranial bones were fashioned into oval amulets with a drilled hole. Similar pendants have been uncovered in Port‑Conty, La Lance, and Concise, all within Switzerland. In Mexico and across the Plains and Great Basin of the United States, necklaces crafted from hand and foot bones have been found; these were either strung as long chains or used as pendants, likely created from slain enemies to symbolize victory.

7. Bones As Musical Instruments

The Aztecs produced an instrument known as an omichicahuaztli from human leg or arm bones, creating a percussion device marked with notches. These bone instruments appear at archaeological sites throughout the empire, though occasionally animal bones—like turtle scapulae or whale ribs—served the same purpose.

Tibetan Buddhists employed a trumpet‑like instrument called a kangling, crafted from a human femur. Used in Tantric and funerary rites, it reminded participants of the body’s transience. The bone was preferably taken from a criminal or someone who suffered a violent death; if unavailable, a teacher’s femur could be used. Originating in India 1,500 years ago, the kangling spread to Tibet around AD 800.

6. Ritual Corpse Mutilation

In Brazil’s Lapa do Santo cave, some of the New World’s oldest skeletons have been uncovered. Humans inhabited the site for roughly 12,000 years, initially burying the dead intact. Between 9,600 and 9,400 years ago, funerary customs shifted dramatically: corpses were systematically mutilated. Teeth were extracted post‑mortem, bodies were dismembered and de‑fleshed, and evidence points to burning or cannibalism, with some bones later placed inside another individual’s cranium. No other burial goods appear from this period, suggesting the mutilation itself was the primary ritual practice.

5. Ritual Decapitation

Removing a head after death has been a global method of showcasing power and triumph over foes. One Lapa do Santo skeleton shows a post‑mortem decapitation achieved by twisting and pulling the head off the neck; the head was interred separately, with the hands placed over the face—one palm up, the other down.

In Dorset, England, a mass grave containing 54 Scandinavian Vikings dated between AD 910 and 1030 revealed a similar practice. All were young males with no battle wounds. Their bodies were buried together, while 51 skulls lay in a separate pile, having been crudely chopped off shortly after death. Three heads remain missing, possibly belonging to high‑status individuals whose heads were displayed elsewhere to prove defeat.

4. Head Shrinking

The Jivaro peoples of the Amazon jungle in southern Ecuador and northern Peru practiced head shrinking—creating tsantsas from enemies’ heads. This ritual served three purposes: preventing the victim’s vengeful spirit from escaping, displaying tribal strength, and proving to ancestors that revenge had been exacted.

To shrink a head, the victim was decapitated immediately after death. The skin was peeled away, then the scalp underwent a week‑long boiling process at a precise temperature, after which the eyelids were sewn shut, wooden pegs kept the mouth closed, hot stones and sand filled the interior, and charcoal was rubbed over it. Once completed, the shrunken head was worn as a necklace, often discarded after being shown off. Western collectors later commodified the practice until the 1930s, when the sale of shrunken heads was banned.

3. Vampire Treatments

Fears of vampires prompted various post‑mortem treatments to ensure the dead stayed dead. In 16th‑century Venice, a brick was forced into a plague victim’s mouth, often breaking teeth, before burial. Other European sites reveal bodies pierced with iron stakes—two 800‑year‑old corpses from Sozopol, Bulgaria, had large iron rods driven through their chests. A 700‑year‑old Bulgarian male also bore a chest stake and had his teeth extracted post‑mortem.

Polish burials show similar anti‑vampire measures: a rock and a sickle placed across the necks of two middle‑aged women, and a male and female decapitated and interred on their sides. These practices aimed to prevent the deceased from rising as blood‑thirsty specters.

2. Mellified Men

Unlike the other entries, mellification began before death. In 12th‑century Arabia, some men who sensed their end approached began subsisting solely on pure honey, even bathing in it. This self‑induced honey diet eventually killed them; their bodies were then placed in stone coffins filled with additional honey. Centuries later, these honey‑preserved corpses were retrieved, broken into pieces, and sold as medicinal candy at bazaars.

Chinese traveler Li Shizhen described the practice in his 16th‑century compendium Bencao Gangmu. While scholars debate its historicity, honey‑preserved remains have been found: a 4,300‑year‑old Georgian mummy, accounts of Alexander the Great’s honey‑coffin, and Herodotus’s note on Assyrian honey embalming.

1. Possible Cannibalism

Although not a deliberate body‑modification, cannibalism leaves unmistakable marks on skeletal remains. At El Sidrón, Spain, 12 Neanderthal skeletons—about 49,000 years old—show evidence of cannibalism: long bones were cracked open to extract marrow, and cut marks suggest de‑fleshing and disarticulation.

Researchers have also identified gnaw marks on human bones: 12,000‑year‑old remains from Gough’s Cave, England, and even 800,000‑year‑old Homo antecessor bones from Gran Dolina, Spain. These findings indicate that cannibalistic behavior spanned multiple hominin species.

Throughout history, humanity has tried to bend the forces of nature to its will. Agriculture is a prime example: we learned to grow food on our own terms instead of hunting endlessly. Yet the weather remains a stubborn opponent, dictating harvests, wars, and daily life. In this top 10 crazy roundup, we dive into the most out‑there schemes ever dreamed up to control the skies.

Why the Top 10 Crazy Weather Experiments Matter

10 Shoot And Be Noisy To Stop Hail

A hailstorm can easily destroy fields of crops. Even in ancient times, some people realized that they couldn’t pray away the hail. In fact, ancient Roman legal code called the Twelve Tables prohibited superstition in the fight against hail. Technically, it didn’t say anything about fighting hail with weapons and sound, though.

This started a tradition despite laws to stop people from doing so. In 789, Charlemagne (aka Charles The Great), king of the Franks, had to forbid people from ringing church bells and exhibiting prayer tables every time there was hail.

Later, people moved to firing arrows at the clouds. When gunpowder became widespread, cannons, muskets, and rifles were used. In 1750, the Austrian Empire made this illegal. However, by 1886, they seemed to have given up and were conducting their own anti‑hail experiments by firing big mortars at the clouds.

9 Plant Forest, Burn, Repeat

In 1836, James Pollard Espy, the US government’s first official meteorologist, devised an answer to the question of how to cause storms: set stuff on fire. His theory was that storms are created by hot air rising in columns (which produces rainfall).

He wanted a forest stretching north to south in the western US. Sections could be burned if rain was requested by farmers. This idea was rejected by the government despite his polite request for a 966‑kilometer (600 mi) stretch to use as a test. Some scientists pointed out that forest fires happen all the time without creating rainfall, which didn’t help his case.

However, some people were worried that Espy’s method would be successful and give power to the federal government to control the weather. Senator John Crittenden of Kentucky noted, “And if he possesses the power of causing rain, he may also possess the power of withholding it.”

Essentially, they thought Espy was going to turn into a crazed weather dictator with government approval.

8 Blowing Up Government Money

At least one man was given money by the US Congress to carry out his weather experiments. In August 1891, Robert St. George Dyrenforth traveled to Midland, Texas, with $9,000 worth of an arsenal, including massive kites, 3‑ to 6‑meter‑tall (10‑20 ft) balloons, mortars, six kegs of blasting powder, and 230 kilograms (500 lb) of manganese oxide.

The plan: Blow up the sky with exploding kites and balloons.

Initially, things went well because no big newspapers sent reporters to check on Dyrenforth. He was taking credit for rain that happened far away from his site and even for showers predicted by the Weather Bureau. The Sun described it as “a great success” despite never having been there.

In 1892, Congress gave Dyrenforth another $10,000, but his luck ran out. In October 1892, his nighttime explosions in the Washington, DC, area around Fort Myer produced nothing in the diverse community but “profanity in 17 different languages.”

By December, Dyrenforth had moved to Texas. There, the media started turning against him. A San Antonio newspaper wrote that his plans had “gone up like a rocket and come down like a stick.” After that, Congress refused to give him the remaining $5,000 in his budget, which ended his adventure.

7 The Rainmaking Gun

The Steiger Vortex gun, designed by Albert Steiger, was a 5‑meter‑tall (16.4 ft) metal device shaped like an ice cream cone. The gun was designed to produce vibrations that destroyed hail and caused rain. It was used in Austria to protect wine‑growing regions.

Clement Wragge, a government meteorologist in Australia, was impressed by this and decided to bring the technology back to his homeland. Six guns were placed in Charleville in September 1902. Despite firing repeatedly at two‑minute intervals, no rain was produced. In fact, the only thing dampened was Wragge’s career in meteorology.

6 Melting The Ice Caps

In this era of climate change anxiety, we are often told that we should be concerned with the melting of ice caps and the poles. Back in the day, though, they wanted to declare outright war on these things.

Writing in The Atlantic Monthly in 1877, N.S. Shaler had nothing but hate for the poles, describing the cold weather they brought as “ruthless as Huns, slaying and scalping all the creatures of summer like barbarians as they are.”

In his opinion, we needed to reroute the Pacific Ocean’s warm Kuroshio Current through the Bering Strait. This would cause arctic temperatures to rise by 16.67 degrees Celsius (30 °F), and we wouldn’t have to deal with winter anymore in North America.

5 Move The Earth

In late 1912, the North Pole and the South Pole were still considered the enemy. According to The New York Times, we needed to end “the iceberg menace.” The Titanic had sunk in April of that year, so maybe the hostility was understandable. Carroll Livingston Riker, an engineer from New York, had a $190 million plan.

He wanted to reroute the Gulf Stream by building a 320‑kilometer (200 mi) jetty eastward from Newfoundland. This would have obstructed the cold Labrador Current and moved it eastward to meet the Gulf Stream (which was moving northward) in deep water. The jetty would have had 9 meters (30 ft) of rocks upon it.

Warm water is lighter than cold water, so warm water would have been able to travel farther—approximately 645 kilometers (400 mi) north to warm those currents as well. According to Riker’s theory, this would have melted Greenland’s heavy ice cap and shifted the Earth’s axis.

Nothing came of these plans, and the poles were safe for another day.

4 The Nuclear Solution

In 1945, Julian Huxley, a cofounder of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), spoke at a conference in Madison Square Garden about using nuclear bombs as “atomic dynamite [for] landscaping the Earth” (melting the polar ice cap).

This was extremely inappropriate for two reasons. First, the US had just dropped two nuclear bombs on Japan, killing over 100,000 people. Second, this conference was about arms control, which leaves us somewhat doubtful that the participants wanted to drop more nuclear bombs.

3 Build A Huge Dam

Although Russia is a huge landmass, a lot of it is covered in ice or is inhospitable due to the extreme cold. During the Cold War, the Soviets planned to build a massive dam from their eastern coast to Alaska. This was another attempt to direct the Gulf Stream up north and warm the Arctic. In this case, it would have opened up more landmass for the Soviets to use.

Even crazier, the Americans almost agreed to this plan despite being in the middle of the Cold War. The Soviets argued that everyone was likely to benefit from a warmer climate. The idea was floated to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists who brought up the matter in the 1960 presidential debates.

Then‑Senator John F. Kennedy responded that it was “certainly worth exploring” in the context of greater cooperation.

2 Grand Theft Cloud

In 2018, Iran accused Israel of stealing water from clouds before they reached Iran. At that time, Brigadier General Gholam Reza Jalali, head of Iran’s Civil Defense Organization, declared, “We are faced with the cases of cloud theft and snow theft.” He also referred to a study which had concluded that all highlands above 2,200 meters (7,200 ft) from the Mediterranean to Afghanistan—except for those in Iran—had received snowfall.

Fortunately, Ahad Vazife of the Iran Meteorological Organization stepped in to stop this from escalating into a full‑scale diplomatic war at a time when the two countries were at odds over Syria. Vazife pointed out that if countries could hijack clouds, then the US would not have been suffering from a water shortage. According to Vazife, the Americans would have just stolen someone else’s rainfall.

1 Burning Up The Sky

Sometimes, seemingly crazy ideas can work. During World War II, the Royal Air Force (RAF) invented the Fog Investigation and Dispersal Operation (FIDO) system to allow their planes to take off in foggy conditions.

FIDO worked by running pipes with burners around airfields. These would be fed by tanks of petrol, causing flames to shoot up and raise temperatures enough to disperse fog. It allowed the RAF to get planes airborne and attack German forces that were still grounded by the fog.

The operation ran from 1943 to 1945 but was discontinued due to the costs. The RAF had burned over 380,000 liters (100,000 gal) of petrol per hour to operate FIDO. The project remained dormant until 1959 when the last system was removed from RAF Manston.

WARNING: This list contains disturbing footage. Archaeologists have uncovered countless ways humans have altered their own flesh throughout the ages. While a simple ear‑piercing or a fresh tattoo is commonplace today, certain societies have taken body modification to astonishing extremes. Join us for a top 10 fascinating tour of these eye‑opening customs.

Top 10 Fascinating Practices Explained

10 Neck Elongation

Neck elongation involves the gradual addition of heavy brass rings around a woman’s neck, creating the illusion of an impossibly long neck. The rings don’t actually stretch the neck; instead, they push the clavicle and upper ribs downward, making the neck appear extended.

As the rings accumulate, their weight forces the collarbone and ribs to shift roughly 45° lower than their natural position. Though variations exist across Africa and Asia, the most iconic example comes from the Kayan Lahwi tribe of Myanmar.

Girls begin wearing the first brass collar as early as two to five years old. Over the years, additional rings are added, progressively deforming the bones to sustain the elongated look. Marco Polo first reported this custom to Europe around 1300 AD.

The alteration is essentially permanent. Removing the rings is technically possible but risky; improper removal can be fatal, and even a careful extraction is excruciating. Consequently, most women accept the rings as a lifelong commitment.

9 Lip Plates

While many Westerners are familiar with stretching earlobes, some African cultures have been inserting ever‑larger plates into pierced lips for centuries. Clay or wooden disks are gradually enlarged until a substantial lip plate can be displayed.

This practice emerged independently at least six times—in Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Mesoamerica, and Ecuador—with African examples dating back to 8700 BC. Today, Ethiopia remains the hotspot for lip‑plate tradition.

The Mursi and Surma peoples of the lower Omo River valley begin the ritual roughly six to twelve months before a young woman’s marriage, usually between ages 15 and 18. The first step is a simple wooden peg inserted into the lower lip.

Over time the peg is swapped for larger ones, culminating in a full plate. In 2014 the world’s largest recorded plate measured 23.4 inches (59.5 cm) in circumference and 7.6 inches (19.5 cm) wide.

8 Blackening & Filing Teeth

The Bagobo tribe of Mindanao in the southern Philippines maintains a rite of passage that sharpens and blacks the teeth of its youth. Historically linked to the spread of Hinduism, this custom persists among some community members today.

When a Bagobo adolescent reaches puberty, the teeth are filed by pressing the teen’s head against the practitioner’s shoulder while the teen bites a wooden stick, shaving the teeth down to sharp points.

After filing, the teeth are blackened using a powder derived from a specific tree or from black smoke filtered through bamboo. This dark coating completes the transformation.

During the entire procedure the participant may not drink water, consume sour foods, or attend funerals—preventing the display of their imperfect teeth from causing offense.

7 Circumcision

Modern medicine often frames circumcision as a routine health procedure, yet it has deep cultural roots and qualifies as a form of body modification. The operation removes the foreskin covering the glans of the penis.

Although most Western hospitals perform circumcisions on newborns without explicit cultural or religious motivations, the practice traces back to eastern Africa sometime after 3000 BC.

Early evidence suggests the foreskin, a primary erogenous zone, was removed as a symbolic sacrifice of earthly pleasure for potential spiritual benefit. The ritual later entered Jewish tradition, where boys are circumcised on the eighth day after birth as a covenant with God.

Thus, circumcision bridges ancient cultural symbolism and contemporary medical practice, illustrating how body alteration can serve multiple societal functions.

6 Scarification

Scarification, a sibling of tattooing, creates permanent designs by cutting, branding, or scratching the skin, leaving raised scars that form the intended image.

Communities employ scarification for rites of passage, religious devotion, or social status. Because the resulting marks contrast sharply on darker skin, the practice is especially prevalent across sub‑Saharan, West, and East African cultures, including the Gonja, Tiv, and Maasai.

Unlike tattooing, scarification inflicts greater trauma, raising infection risks and demanding longer healing intervals between sessions.

The method can involve intricate patterns, each carrying specific cultural meaning, and often requires a seasoned practitioner to ensure the scars heal in the desired shape.

See Also: 10 Horrifically Botched Circumcisions

5 Fingertip Removal—Dani Village, New Guinea

Fingertip amputation appears in several societies, from Japanese Yakuza to the remote Dani tribe of Indonesia’s highlands. In the Dani community, the ritual is known as Ikipalin.

When a loved one passes away, women of the tribe surgically remove the upper half of their fingers to protect the family from the spirit of the deceased. The act is believed to keep restless souls at bay.

Ikipalin also serves as a visible sign of mourning; mothers may even bite the fingertips off their infants so the children partake in the tradition from birth.

Although the Indonesian government has outlawed the practice, it reportedly persists in parts of Western New Guinea, where older women often display missing fingertip portions.

4 Genital Beading

Genital beading—also called pearling—originated in Southeast Asia around the early 1400s. The practice gained notoriety through Yakuza members, who insert a single pearl for each year of imprisonment.

Pearling entails embedding tiny beads beneath the genital skin. Men typically place beads along the penile shaft, while women may insert them under the labial tissue. The primary aim is to heighten sexual sensation for partners during intercourse.

Early versions used actual pearls, but modern practitioners favor biocompatible materials like surgical steel, titanium, Teflon, and silicone to minimize health risks.

Today, Filipino sailors are famed for adopting pearling as a way to impress women in port cities, often boasting that their beaded enhancements make them especially desirable.

3 Female Genital Mutilation

Female genital mutilation (FGM) seeks to eradicate erogenous tissue by removing the clitoral hood, clitoral glans, and sometimes the inner and outer labia, leaving only a small opening for urine and menstrual flow.

Although widely condemned as a human‑rights violation, an estimated 200 million women across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia continue to endure the practice.

FGM’s origins are murky, but evidence points to its existence in Egypt’s Middle Kingdom around 2050 BC, as suggested by hieroglyphic references, though no mummified remains conclusively display the cuts.

Ancient Egyptian writers, such as Pilio of Alexandria, noted that “the Egyptians…circumcise the marriageable youth and maid in the fourteenth year of their age when the male begins to get seed, and the female to have a menstrual flow.”

2 Foot Binding

Foot binding, a Chinese tradition, involved tightly wrapping young girls’ feet, gradually reshaping them into the coveted “lotus foot” – a small, arched foot with toes tucked under the sole.

The custom likely began among elite dancers in the 10th century, later spreading to the Song‑era aristocracy and eventually permeating all social classes by the Qing dynasty.

Girls as young as four would start the binding in winter, soaking their feet in a herbal‑blood mixture, trimming nails short, and then applying relentless pressure until the toes fractured and the arches collapsed.

The process could last years, with bindings tightened repeatedly until the foot achieved the desired diminutive shape. The practice faded in the 20th century as modern reforms took hold.

1 Head Shaping

Head shaping, or artificial cranial deformation, alters a child’s skull by flattening or binding it before the fontanelles close, producing a deliberately misshapen head.

Archaeological evidence shows head shaping predates written history, with proto‑Neolithic skeletons from as early as 9000 BC displaying elongated, almost conical crania.

Hippocrates documented the “Macrocephali,” or long‑heads, around 400 BC. In the Americas, the Maya and Inca practiced cranial modification, as did some North‑American indigenous groups.

In Europe, French families continued head shaping into the late 1800s, using tight bandages for two to four months, then replacing them with a fitted basket reinforced with metal threads as the child grew.

The Vanuatu people of Tommen Island maintained the custom well into the 20th century, though it has largely disappeared today.

See Also: Top 10 Human Sideshow Freaks