March 10, 2009—Among the many medieval plague victims recently unearthed near Venice, Italy, one reportedly had never-before-seen evidence of an unusual affliction: being "undead."

The partial body and skull of the woman showed her jaw forced open by a brick (above)—an exorcism technique used on suspected vampires.

It's the first time that archaeological remains have been interpreted as belonging to a suspected vampire, team leader Matteo Borrini, a forensic archaeologist at the University of Florence, told National Geographic News.

Borrini has been digging up mass graves on the island of Lazzaretto Nuovo, where the "vampire" was found, since 2006.

"I was lucky. I [didn't] expect to find a vampire during my excavations," he said.

Belief in vampires was rampant in the Middle Ages, mostly because the process of decomposition was not well understood.

For instance, as the human stomach decays, it releases a dark "purge fluid." This bloodlike liquid can flow freely from a corpse's nose and mouth, so it was apparently sometimes confused with traces of vampire victims' blood.

The fluid sometimes moistened the burial shroud near the corpse's mouth enough that it sagged into the jaw, creating tears in the cloth.

Since tombs were often reopened during plagues so other victims could be added, Italian gravediggers saw these decomposing bodies with partially "eaten" shrouds, Borrini said.

Vampires were thought by some to be causes of plagues, so the superstition took root that shroud-chewing was the "magical way" that vampires spread pestilence, he said. Inserting objects—such as bricks and stones—into the mouths of alleged vampires was thought to halt the disease.

—Christine Dell'Amore

Photograph courtesy Matteo Borrini

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The Secret Message Lincoln Never Knew About

Museum finds "secret" message in Lincoln's watch

Wed Mar 11, 11:02 am ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A gold watch owned by Abraham Lincoln bears a message marking the start of the U.S. Civil War, but the president never knew of the "secret" inscription uncovered on Tuesday at the National Museum of American History.

The engraving, by watchmaker Jonathan Dillon, is dated April 13, 1861, and reads in part: "Fort Sumpter was attacked by the rebels" and "thank God we have a government."

The museum said it agreed to open the watch to find out if the message really was there after it was contacted by the watchmaker's great-great-grandson, Doug Stiles of Waukegan, Illinois.

The American Civil War began when Confederate troops opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, on April 12, 1861.

Forty-five years later, Dillon the watchmaker told The New York Times that he was repairing Lincoln's watch when he heard that the first shots of the Civil War had been fired.

Dillon said he unscrewed the dial of the watch and used a sharp instrument to mark the historic day on the president's watch. He told the newspaper that, as far as he knew, no one had ever seen the inscription.

"Lincoln never knew of the message he carried in his pocket," Brent Glass, director of the National Museum of American History said in a statement. "It's a personal side of history about an ordinary watchman being inspired to record something for posterity."

Lincoln was elected the 16th president of the United States in November 1860. In the lead up to the Civil War, South Carolina and six other states seceded from the Union before Lincoln's inauguration in March 1861.

(Reporting by JoAnne Allen; Editing by Patricia Zengerle)