Two hundred skeletons discovered under Paris supermarket

The bodies of more than 200 men, women and children have been found buried underneath a Paris supermarket.

When the owners of the store excavated their basement during renovations they were aware they could find a few bones – the structure is built on the site of a medieval hospital that operated until the 18^th Century.

But they did not anticipate the 200-plus skeletons they found stacked as many as six deep in the eight separate pits that have been dug out so far.

The unnerving discovery, with the bodies of men, women and children laid end-to-end, indicates a major epidemic or famine, experts say.

The find has shocked the owners of the supermarket, who expected some bodies, but not the mass grave they uncovered.

"We expected it to have a few bones to the extent that it had been a cemetery but not find mass graves," store manager Pascal Roy told AFP.

The remains are being carbon dated to determine when they died.