A number of human skulls and other bones have been found in the shallow waters of the Spui river near the village of Zuidland, south of Rotterdam.

The grim find was made on Friday by a local who was planning to go fishing in his canoe. Erik Sagan told the AD he decided to launch his boat from a different spot than usual and saw a skull in the shallow water.

‘I looked at my foot and … the back of the skull was on the bottom, with the eye sockets staring up at me,’ he said.

Sagan alerted the police who came to collect the skulls, but on Sunday, Sagan found even more, some of which were in a plastic rubbish bag.

‘The skulls themselves look very old but the rubbish bag was new. There was no algae on it,’ he told the paper.

Some of the skulls were complete, others did not have the lower jaw. Sagan told Media-TV they had found 10 to 15 skulls in total.

Police say the bones do not appear to have come from a recent crime but as yet have no idea as to their origin or how old they are. The bones have been taken to the Dutch forensic institute to be researched.