Human engagement with #death led to a variety of #mortuary practices. In #archaeology we're usually confronted with their final result - but too often left with only vague ideas of underlying concepts.
This makes rather peculiar appearing present #funeral practices valuable sources, at least to sound the range of cultural possibilities.
A short thread. ⚰️🧵
The custom of so-called #SykBurials, for instance reportedly still practiced in some parts of Asia, is one of those cues allowing us at least a gentle glimpse into the manifold different #corpses are treated including different world views and concepts of (ways into) an #afterlife or #otherworld":
https://aeon.co/videos/to-tibetan-buddhists-sky-burials-are-sacred-to-tourists-theyre-a-morbid-curiosity via aeon.co
Consigning the physical remains of #deceased to scavenging birds is an indeed interesting concept:
Transporting the #dead body (and undead soul?) into an #afterlife (however it may be imagined) - figuratively ("flying away with the bird") as well as literally (i.e. being fed upon rather than decaying).
Best known examples might be e.g. the famous #Neolithic plastered human #skulls 💀 from sites like #TellEsSultan (#Jericho):
Selected individual's heads apparently were given back a #face with the help of gypsum, shells and paint - and then probably put on display (before later being reburied again).
https://www.britishmuseum.org/blog/facing-past-jericho-skull
Another interesting example are the also #Neolithic #burials from #KörtikTepe in #Turkey:
Here, the #bones of many individuals were plaster-covered - and/or even elaborately painted.
Bone or Flesh: Defleshing and Post-Depositional Treatments at Körtik Tepe (Southeastern Anatolia, PPNA Period) - Volume 18 Issue 1
Interestingly, there are #Neolithic contexts and even physical traces on #bones which could hint at, as Hodder & Meskell put it in their 2011 article in Current Anthropology 52(2), "a concern for the processes of #bodily #articulation or #disarticulation".
http://radicalanthropologygroup.org/sites/default/files/pdf/class_text_136.pdf
Among such traces are, for instance, #CutMarks on human bones - whose origin and meaning, admittedly, could have a variety of possible reasons ... of which the removal of flesh (physical "#excarnation") *might* be one.
This rather recent study on skull fragments from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic site of #GöbekliTepe may illustrate that point:
The complex #PPN #iconography adds to this. A recurring motive at #Neolithic sites like e.g. #GöbekliTepe, #CatalHöyük and others are depictions of birds (in particular: #vultures) as well as separated human heads - or headless bodies:
Furthermore: among the bones of birds found at #GöbekliTepe, necrophagous species (i.e. such birds feeding on flesh, i.a. corpses) like #vultures and #corvids (crows, ravens etc.) were dominating - much more than usually expected in contemporary settlements:
Modern archaeology has amassed considerable evidence for the disposal of the dead through burials, cemeteries and other monuments. Drawing on this body of evidence, this book offers fresh insight into how early human societies conceived of death and the afterlife. The twenty-seven essays in this volume consider the rituals and responses to death in prehistoric societies across the world, from eastern Asia through Europe to the Americas, and from the very earliest times before developed religious beliefs offered scriptural answers to these questions. Compiled and written by leading prehistorians and archaeologists, this volume traces the emergence of death as a concept in early times, as well as a contributing factor to the formation of communities and social hierarchies, and sometimes the creation of divinities.
To this day, the practice of #SkyBurials remains an often referenced cultural phenomenon in the discussion of "special" (i.e. "odd" in our western / Global North perception) #burial customs:
https://www.nytimes.com/1999/07/03/world/lirong-journal-tibetans-and-vultures-keep-ancient-burial-rite.html via @nytimes
Tibetans have three principal ways to return their dead to earth; in sky burial, body is dismembered and fed to vultures; in water burial, corpse is cut into small pieces and fed to fish; third way, cremation, is too expensive for poorest Tibetans; photo; map (M)
#Neolithic #Catalhöyük (also Turkey) does indeed as well show a noteworthy complexity of #funerary ritual.
In this context in particularly interesting is the removal of #skulls from #burials, their #replastering and #circulation among the settlement.
This and the practice of '#secondary' (i.e. re-) burial seems a particular phenomenon of the later phases pf occupation at #Catalhöyük:
Even more interesting is apparent evidence for #delayed #burials at #Catalhöyük - and the description of special treatment of bodies to keep them in anatomical position (e.g. by wrapping bundles etc.):
And, interestingly, also #smoking was a particularly mentioned example for such special treatment of corpses.
Indeed, there are again ethnographic analogies for this peculiar practice too: thinking e.g. the smoked #Anga #mummies from #PapuaNewGuinea.
https://www.livescience.com/50948-photos-smoked-mummies-papua-new-guinea.html
Interesting side note:
#PapuaNewGuinea is also known for #plastered human #skulls - here an example (dating to 1961) as seen in Moesgaard Museum (Denmark).
Coming back to #smoking: There does indeed seem to be a curious relation of concepts (and techniques) regarding #preservation of food ... and corpses:
https://www.sapiens.org/biology/embalming-culture-mortuary-customs via sapiens.org
Of course I do not intend to equal modern-day (or even historic) #funerary customs (like e.g. #SkyBurial in Asia) with prehistoric practices.
But #analogies like these do imho provide a useful frame to evaluate the archaeological data along a large variety of human responses towards #death - and the treating the #dead.
@jens2go @jens2go OK, I have to admit, if social scientists studying rituals will CW every post (same as biologists studying worms, or people living in Ukraine), this will make this platform rather hard to use.
(Thank god there's a setting to auto-expand all CWs, but it doesn't remove the repetitive title, at least not on web interface)
@ampanmdagaba Sorry if this interfered with reading accessibility, but the "title" was added automatically to each reply.
Still trying to figure out how to best compose threads here, but still trying to not burst into everybody's timeline with images of dead bodies.
@jens2go Yeah, I totally get it! Sorry for being sarcastic; it never ever helps, trying to be sarcastic :)
I'm just still baffled by claims that researchers of certain topics and citizens of certain countries need to CV each and every post they make. Surely there is a better solution to that. (Even though the _idea_ of CW is absolutely great of course!)
Jens Notroff
Arseny Khakhalin
nyzn