Perinatal burials in the Roman period are rare in military contexts, as such interments were usually limited to domestic settings or, in exceptional cases, public buildings during inauguration rituals. Recent excavations at the Castrum of Legio VI Victrix in León, Spain (29 BC–AD 74), found a perinatal burial inside a contubernium workshop, challenging assumptions about the separation of military and domestic life. Skeletal analysis estimated the age at 38–42 gestational weeks, with death occurring at or shortly after birth from natural causes, as no trauma was found. This discovery offers unique insight into legal frameworks, the presence of women and children in military sites, and ritual practices in early imperial Rome. It challenges traditional views of military sites as exclusively male spaces and highlights the complexity of funerary and ritual practices, emphasizing the need to reconsider responses to perinatal death in Roman society.
Viejo et al. (Wed,) studied this question.