Initial assumptions that the site might have been an ancient Votic burial ground turned out to be false.

The Votes were an ethnic group who spoke a Finnic language, related to both Estonian and Finnish, and whose homeland was roughly the area east of the Narva River, as far as present-day St. Petersburg.

As such many migrated westwards, into present-day Estonia and Latvia.

Osteoarchaeologist Martin Malve said: "The majority of the remains had been lifted out by the excavator."

"In some cases, only parts of the chest or feet were left in situ. Despite this, we managed to sift everything out from the earth piles," adding that metal detectors, hand tools and even the excavator itself were pressed into use.

"Everything was sorted, and we amassed the bones and artifacts," Malve added, stating that the burials likely date from the later middle ages or even the early modern period.

A coin from as early as the 14th century was found in one of the grave sites, whereas, archaeologist Anti Lillak said, Votes who resided in present-day Estonia tended to adopt local burial customs, which meant a paucity of grave goods buried for the deceased's supposed use in an afterlife.

"They may have also linguistically assimilated over time," Lillak said.

The archaeological dig has revealed that last fall when digging a trench at Kuremäe, a mechanical excavator operator inadvertently and unintentionally disturbed the remains of at least seven individuals in the course of work to install a heating system.

Since the bones were scattered, the exact number of disturbed skeletons is still undetermined.

Thirty test pits were dug in Kuremäe following the finds, leading to the discovery of new burial sites.

Conversely, some sites previously thought to contain graves were found to harbor no burials after all.

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