Jamestown colonists killed and ate the dogs of Indigenous Americans

These butchered dog bones were found in the well of a fort at Jamestown. Photo courtesy Jamestown Rediscovery Foundation (Preservation Virginia).

Colonists at Jamestown — one of the first English colonies in North America — likely killed and ate local dogs, a new study finds.

Most of the dog bones excavated at Jamestown have cut marks on them, suggesting that "it is possible that they were eaten," study co-author Ariane Thomas, a doctoral student of biological anthropology at the University of Iowa, told Live Science in an email.