Beginning in 5300 BC, a Linearbandkeramik or Linear Pottery culture (LBK) developed in the region of Herxheim in southwest Germany, one that could be described as an idyllic Stone Age settlement. The houses were the same, the rudimentary farm plots were the same, the small village seemed to be relatively safe from invaders and predators. Yet sometime around 4950 BC, the community abruptly disappeared. The town was abandoned, leaving behind shattered pottery, hundreds of butchered bodies, and a huge pile of bones. Today, researchers are not certain what happened but signs suggest that a rise in ritual sacrifice, and possibly cannibalism, had something to do with it.?