Skeleton found beneath driveway dates back 1,300 years

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A skeleton found under a south London driveway dates back 1,300 years to a century before Alfred The Great became King.

The almost-complete adult skeleton was unearthed in Croydon, south London, along with a child's bone from the same period.

Builder Terry Jobson found the skull and bones just a couple of feet ground while digging up the front garden of Alison, 43, and 48-year-old Michael Carpenters' home while they were on holiday in 2014.

Alison and Michael Carpenter with their children Jasmine, 13, Joel, 11, Toby, 9, and Zac, 15, outside their home in south London where a builder discovered a pile of old human bones

Police sealed off the house and the area was treated as a crime scene while it was established whether to open a murder inquiry.

A sample of the bones was sent to a US laboratory in Florida for carbon dating.

The results showed the bones dated from AD 670 to 775, meaning the person lived and was buried in the Croydon area during the days of the Anglo-Saxons.

The skeleton of the adult, who experts found died no older than the age of 36, and a thigh bone of child aged between three-and-a-half and 11 which was found with it, have now gone on public display at the Museum of Croydon.

A report was commissioned last year to find out more about the skeletons and what they could tell us about the Anglo-Saxon period.

It was conducted by conducted by Dr Rebecca Redfern of the Museum of London's Centre for Human Bioarchaeology.

The in depth report couldn't confirm the sex of the near-complete skeleton - it showed both male and female traits. Neither could the report determine the sex of the child from the single thigh bone.

Museum collections officer Emily Lansell said: