Too many ancestors

Whitley, James

doi:10.1017/s0003598x00089870

Cited by 117 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…That six out of eight normative graves associated with spatial boundaries contained children, adolescents, or young adults suggests that the 'young dead' -whether or not they were regarded as 'ancestors' themselves (Whitley 2002) -may have had a special role to play in forming or reinforcing links between living communities and ancestors. The sixth-century Law 81 of AEthelbert of Kent decrees that in the case of a childless marriage the wife's property should revert to her kin (Hough 1994, 20, n. 5); in a sense, children were required for a marriage to be permanently binding.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Living with the Dead: Human Burials in Anglo-Saxon Settlement Contexts

Sofield

2015

Archaeological Journal

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c l i f f o r d m . s o f i e l d Although the communities of Anglo-Saxon England usually buried their dead in separate cemeteries, a handful of burials have been found in or alongside buildings, settlement ditches, and other domestic features. Such burials have so far escaped systematic study. This article presents a corpus of thirty graves in rural settlement contexts between the fifth and ninth centuries across England. It analyses the demographics, treatment, and pathology of the burials, as well as their spatial associations. Informed by recent approaches to 'placed' deposits, it explores why certain individuals might have been selected for burial in domestic contexts, and how living with the dead affected rural communities.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Living with the Dead: Human Burials in Anglo-Saxon Settlement Contexts

Sofield

2015

Archaeological Journal

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“…Hernando, 1999: 28-34;Esparza, 2001;Gamble, 2002: 143). También podrían haber relacionado tales restos pretéritos o exóti-cos -en cuya manufactura no habían participado ni conocían a nadie que lo hubiera hecho-, como una realidad paralela, mítica o esotérica, protagonizada por seres físicos o fuerzas sobrenaturales no necesariamente benévolos (Whitley, 2002;Hingley, 2009: 144). Su manipulación pudo verse envuelta en la adquisición de conocimiento esotérico, poder sobrenatural o prestigio (Kristiansen y Larsson, 2006;Armada et al, 2008;Hahn y Weiss, 2013).…”

Section: Discussionunclassified

Emulación decorativa y cerámicas ancestrales. Posibles fuentes de inspiración de las alfareras meseteñas de la Edad del Bronce

González¹

2015

Zephyrvs

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) LXXVI, julio-diciembre; [39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56] Resumen: Este artículo explora las semejanzas decorativas entre las cerámicas neolíticas y calcolíticas y la alfarería de estilo Cogotas i. Un enfoque diacrónico que arranca del Neolítico antiguo permite rastrear una serie de motivos y técnicas ornamentales recurrentes a lo largo de la Prehistoria reciente meseteña: similares temas geométricos, el empleo del boquique, la excisión y la incrustación de pasta blanca. Se valoran diversas opciones para comprender tales analogías: mera casualidad, invención independiente, perduración transcultural de procedimientos artesanales. La hipótesis más plausible considera que las artesanas del ii milenio a. C. reintrodujeron tales decisiones tecnológicas conscientes de su otredad. Con ellas elaboraron un código simbólico plasmado en la vajilla, cuya transmisión y reproducción fidedigna fueron de gran importancia. Las alfareras se inspiraron en cerámicas de su pasado, prototipos que pudieron entender como realidades ancestrales, esotéricas o míticas. Semejante decisión cultural resulta coherente con su manipulación habitual de reliquias y cosas extemporáneas o exóticas. Los modos de vida de aquellas gentes facilitaron el encuentro con restos pretéritos, tanto la remoción del suelo -para cultivar y cavar hoyos-en los mismos entornos que ocuparon sus predecesores, como la visita y alteración de viejos túmulos, cuevas y recintos fosados.Palabras clave: Decoración cerámica; imitación; transmisión artesanal; Neolítico; Campaniforme; Cogotas i; Meseta.Abstract: This paper explores decorative resemblances between Neolithic and Chalcolithic ceramics and pottery in the Cogotas i style -Later Bronze Age-. A diachronic approach from the Early Neolithic allows tracking a series of recurring ornamental motifs and techniques throughout later prehistory: comparable geometric themes, the deployment of stab-and-drag -Boquique-and excision techniques and smearing of white inlays. In order to account for such analogies, a suite of options is assessed: mere coincidence, independent innovation, trans-cultural endurance of craftwork procedures. The most likely hypothesis considers a revival of such technological decisions by potters in the second millennium bc; they did so fully aware of their alien character. Such pottery features were used to elaborate a symbolic code displayed on vessels, whose transmission and faithful reproduction were of crucial importance. Ancient potsherds were used as prototypes by potters, and might have been understood as part of ancestral, esoteric or mythical realities. Such cultural preference is consistent with the habitual handling of relics and anachronistic or exotic things. The lifestyles of these people facilitated their encountering of remains from their past, either removing soil (to cultivate and pit-digging) on

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“…is due to change over time, or if it instead reflects the materialization of lived or performed inequalities in the past. The time depth revealed by radiocarbon dating can also problematize the over-used theoretical construct of ancestors (Whitley 2002). If ancestor veneration is a strategy that elites employ as a justification for differential concentration of political power, absolute dating of human remains relative to the use of mortuary features can indicate whether such politically potent ancestors were a generation removed from the community, or whether elites were co-opting the symbols of other earlier groups , Cooney 2014, Schurr, Cook 2014.…”

Section: Approaching Variability In Energy Expenditure and Chronologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Essential Tensions: A Framework for Exploring Inequality Through Mortuary Archaeology and Bioarchaeology

Quinn

Beck

2016

Open Archaeology

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Research on the emergence of institutionalized inequality has traditionally maintained an analytical divide between lived institutions that affect daily life and performed institutions materialized in mortuary contexts. Here, we argue that convergence or divergence between lived and performed contexts reveals key aspects of past social organization. When combined, mortuary archaeology and bioarchaeology provide a methodological framework well suited to evaluate the coherence or dissonance of such institutions. Three case studies from prehistoric Europe highlight how new insights gained by studying tension between institutions, identities and experiences across social dimensions can transform our understanding of the development of institutionalized inequality. "These squat buildings, constructed with huge boulders, are in fact very durable. This is obvious in the many abandoned villages where the houses have disappeared but the tombs are still standing. They are the symbols of the association of their builders with the village where they are situated, an unchanging association with an unchanging order. They are in this way the denial of the fluidity of Merina society and indeed of all the societies of the living. They are an assertion of an order where men are organized along clear-cut lines. In other words, they are the demonstration of what the Merina feels his society was and ought to be"(Bloch 1968:101, emphasis ours).

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Too many ancestors

Abstract: Have ancestors replaces chiefs as the defining entity of prehistory? This provocative viewfrom the Mediterrnnean world m a y provoke a little debate.

Cited by 117 publications

References 14 publications

Living with the Dead: Human Burials in Anglo-Saxon Settlement Contexts

Living with the Dead: Human Burials in Anglo-Saxon Settlement Contexts

Emulación decorativa y cerámicas ancestrales. Posibles fuentes de inspiración de las alfareras meseteñas de la Edad del Bronce

Essential Tensions: A Framework for Exploring Inequality Through Mortuary Archaeology and Bioarchaeology

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