The 2,000-year-old Roman bunny

IT seems the Easter bunny has been around for longer than we thought...

Experts believe they have identified Britain’s first ever rabbit – pushing the previous estimate of when they were introduced back by more than a millennium.

The Normans were thought to be responsible for importing rabbits, which were native to France and Spain. But an ancient bone that languished in a box for the past five decades would suggest the Romans introduced the animals to England 2,000 years ago.

The tibia bone was unearthed during excavation work at Fishbourne Roman Palace in Chichester, West Sussex, in 1964 – but its significance went unnoticed until 2017, when zooarchaeologist Dr Fay Worley recognised it as part of a rabbit. Genetic analysis has now proved she was right. Carbon- dating of the 4cm bone segment suggests the animal was alive in the first century AD.

Testing also indicated the animal was kept in confinement. Fishbourne’s inhabitants were known to be wealthy and kept plenty of animals – so the rabbit may well have been one of their more exotic pets.

Academics from the Universities of Exeter, Oxford and Leicester carried out the research, along with Historic England and the Sussex Archaeological Society. They will now conduct further work to see where the rabbit came from – and how it is related to its modern equivalents.