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In total, the intact remains of 419 men, women and children of African descent were found at the site, where they had been buried individually in wooden boxes. There were no mass burials. Nearly half were children under 12, indicating the high mortality rate of the time. Historians and anthropologists estimate that over the decades, as many as 15,000–20,000 Africans were buried in Lower Manhattan. They have determined that this was the largest colonial-era cemetery for enslaved African people. It is also "possibly the largest and earliest collection of American colonial remains of any ethnic group."<ref name="Spencer"/> Some of the burials included items related to African origins and burial practices.
The work of excavation and study of the remains was considered the "most important historic urban archaeological project undertaken in the United States."<ref name="ABG">[http://www.gsa.gov/africanburialground ''African Burial Ground''], General Services Administration. Retrieved 10 February 2012</ref> These remains stand for the estimated tens of thousands of persons at the burial ground and historically in New York, representing Africans' "critical" role in "the formation and development of this city and, by extension, the Nation."
As a result of public engagement, the Howard University team identified four questions which the community hoped to have answered from studies of the remains:
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