Anglo-Saxons and Franks practiced scalping through much of the 9th century AD.
Archaeological evidence for such practices in
North America dates to at least the early 14th century; a mass grave from that period, containing nearly 500 victims (some with evidence of scalping), was found near present-day Crow Creek,
South Dakota (U.S.). The conflict that killed these individuals is thought to have been precipitated by a prolonged drought, which might have been part of the same climatic cycle that caused the
Ancestral Pueblo (Anasazi) to abandon their homes in the Southwest.
Although historical and archaeological records from the 16th and 17th centuries do not clarify how widespread the practice of scalping was in North America before colonial contact, it is clear that bounties on scalps, together with
aggression between colonizers and
indigenous peoples, increased the level of scalping as North America was colonized by Europeans. For example, Willem Kieft, governor of the Dutch Colony of
New Amsterdam, offered bounties to frontiersmen and soldiers for the scalps of enemy
Indians.