Twenty years of forensic archaeology and anthropology of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) and Francoist Regime

Abstract

Although the investigation of human rights cases often comes late, especially with regard to living relatives, the current investigations searching for victims of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) and the Francoist regime that followed until the 1970s also comes now with better methods of search and identification, which would not have been available decades ago. Since the year 2000, year in which the first scientific investigation of a Spanish Civil War mass grave took place, over 400 graves or mass graves out of the estimated 2000 in Spain have been excavated, totalling over 9000 victims recovered. This paper provides a current state of affairs, particularly relating to the forensic archaeology and forensic anthropology, in the search, excavation and identification of those killed during this conflict in Spain