About One Detail of the Funeral Rite of Ancient Qabala

This article is devoted to the consideration and interpretation of a peculiar detail of the funeral rite observed at the cemeteries of ancient period in the historical region of Qabala - the capital of Caucasian Albania. Attention is focused on ceramic vessels with intentionally made holes, which were revealed in the burials among the grave goods. The vessels with holes were found in the ground burials of Uzuntala and Gushlar cemeteries of the 1st century BCE – 1st century CE, along with skeletons in a contracted position on their sides; as well as in the catacomb burial of Salbir, dating to the I-III centuries CE. In burials nos. 3–7 of Uzuntala, vessels of this type had holes in the center of their bases, and were placed upside down in the grave. In the catacomb burial of Salbir, 1st – 3rd centuries CE, two vases of the same type had large holes on the side of the body. The specific detail of the funeral rite, which is of a particular nature, has been episodically traced in the territory of Azerbaijan since the Bronze Age and continued to exist until the Late Antique period. It allows us to talk of the existence of a ritual that was carried out during the funeral ceremony and reflected some religious ideas associated with the funeral ideology. The authors of the paper suppose that these vessels should, according to prevailing beliefs, symbolize the “exodus of the soul” of the deceased and have no connection with the custom of damage to the inventory.

On the Curious Date of the Rylstone Log-Coffin Burial

Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society ◽

10.1017/ppr.2016.5 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 82 ◽

pp. 383-392 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Nigel D. Melton ◽

Janet Montgomery ◽

Benjamin W. Roberts ◽

Gordon Cook ◽

Susanna Harris

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

Iron Age ◽

Western Europe ◽

The Body ◽

Early Bronze Age ◽

Early Medieval ◽

Extended Body ◽

Radiocarbon Dates ◽

The Bronze Age ◽

Radiocarbon dates have been obtained from a log-coffin burial excavated in 1864 by Canon William Greenwell from a ditched round barrow at Scale House, near Rylstone, North Yorkshire. The oak tree-trunk coffin had contained an extended body wrapped in a wool textile. The body had entirely decayed and there were no other extant grave goods. In the absence of other grave goods, Greenwell attributed the burial to the Bronze Age because it lay under a ditched round barrow and had similarities with log-coffin burials from Britain and Denmark. This attribution has not been questioned since 1864 despite a number of early medieval log-coffin burials subsequently being found in northern Britain. Crucially, the example excavated near Quernmore, Lancashire in 1973, was published as Bronze Age but subsequently radiocarbon dated to ad 430–970. The Rylstone coffin and textile were radiocarbon dated to confirm that the burial was Early Bronze Age and not an early medieval coffin inserted into an earlier funerary monument. Unexpectedly, the dates were neither Early Bronze Age nor early medieval but c. 800 bc, the cusp of the Bronze Age–Iron Age transition in Britain. The burial at Rylstone is, therefore, one of only two sites in Britain, and is unparalleled elsewhere in north-western Europe at a time when disposal of the dead was primarily through dispersed cremated or unburnt disarticulated remains.

SARMATIAN BURIALS EXCAVATED BY DMYTRO BEREZOVETS AT THE LOWER DNIEPER BASIN

Archaeology and Early History of Ukraine ◽

10.37445/adiu.2021.03.22 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 40 (3) ◽

pp. 329-341

Author(s):

A. V. Symonenko

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

Historical Context ◽

Glass Beads ◽

Current Level ◽

Funeral Rite ◽

The Bronze Age ◽

Northern Sector ◽

During the campaigns of 1951 and 1953 Dmytro Berezovets excavated the Sarmatian graves near the Kut, Hrushivka and Marianske villages of Apostolovski district of Dnipropetrovsk region. These materials were published briefly, without typological and chronological definitions and analysis of the historical context, with illustrations of rather low quality. Moreover, there was some confusion and errors later made by some researchers, including the author, which have been replicated with each reference. Therefore, it is worthy to republish these materials from the standpoint of the current level of the Sarmatian studies in order to correct certain errors as well. Dmytro Berezovets has discovered the assemblages both of Early Sarmatian (Kut, Hrushivka, Maryanske, barrow 3, grave 4) and Middle Sarmatian Age (Marianske, barroow 5, graves 5—7; barrow 5, grave 6; barrow 6, grave 14) according to traditional chronology. All Sarmatian burials under study were the secondary graves in the Bronze Age mounds and Scythian ones. The skeletons lied supine, with their heads directed to Northern sector. Among the grave goods are the Roman and Sarmatiam pottery, simple bronze adornment, cornelian, jade and glass beads, bronze mirror, bone ritual spoon etc. The Early Sarmatian assemblages discovered by Dmytro Berezovets are dated to the late 2nd—1st century BC, the Middle Sarmatiam ones to the 1st—2nd centuries AD. The identical funeral rite of the graves of different date near Marianske once again confirms the validity of the periodization proposed by me in due time, according to which all the graves under study belong to different phases of the first period (phase A2 — Kut, Hrushivka, Marianske, barrow 3, grave 4; phase B — Marianske, barrow 3, graves 5—7; barrow 5, grave 6; barrow 6, grave 14).

A gold diadem from Aegina

The Journal of Hellenic Studies ◽

10.2307/630083 ◽

1987 ◽

Vol 107 ◽

pp. 182-182

Author(s):

Reynold Higgins

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

British Museum ◽

The South ◽

North West ◽

The North ◽

The Dead ◽

Middle Helladic ◽

Dead Man ◽

The Bronze Age ◽

A recent discovery on the island of Aegina by Professor H. Walter (University of Salzburg) throws a new light on the origins of the so-called Aegina Treasure in the British Museum.In 1982 the Austrians were excavating the Bronze Age settlement on Cape Kolonna, to the north-west of Aegina town. Immediately to the east of the ruined Temple of Apollo, and close to the South Gate of the prehistoric Lower Town, they found an unrobbed shaft grave containing the burial of a warrior. The gravegoods (now exhibited in the splendid new Museum on the Kolonna site) included a bronze sword with a gold and ivory hilt, three bronze daggers, one with gold fittings, a bronze spear-head, arrowheads of obsidian, boar's tusks from a helmet, and fragments of a gold diadem (plate Va). The grave also contained Middle Minoan, Middle Cycladic, and Middle Helladic (Mattpainted) pottery. The pottery and the location of the grave in association with the ‘Ninth City’ combine to give a date for the burial of about 1700 BC; and the richness of the grave-goods would suggest that the dead man was a king.

/ Schyłek epoki kamienia i początki epoki brązu w okolicach Igołomi i Wawrzeńczyc The end of the Stone Age and the beginning of the Bronze Age in the vicinity of Igołomia and Wawrzeńczyce

Kartki z dziejów igołomskiego powiśla ◽

10.33547/igolomia2020.06 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 93-114

Author(s):

Piotr Włodarczak

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

Early Bronze Age ◽

Burial Mound ◽

Funeral Rite ◽

Loess Hills ◽

Vistula River ◽

The North ◽

Funnel Beaker Culture ◽

Age Range ◽

The borderland of the Vistula Plain and the Proszowice Plateau is part of the loess zone extending mainly to the north of the Vistula River, known for numerous discoveries of archaeological sites from the Eneolithic period and the early Bronze Age. The state of reconnaissance of settlement is far from satisfactory here. From the final Eneolithic period primarily cemeteries of the Corded Ware culture (around 2800–2300 BC) are known. Falling within this age range is probably the only burial mound in the area, in Igołomia, which yielded a niche grave of the Corded Ware culture within the eastern part of its cover. Another cemetery was investigated in Rudno Górne, where niche graves of the culture in question were found dug into the embankments of Funnel Beaker culture megalithic graves from the middle Eneolithic period. From the early Bronze Age, the richest and most cognitively significant sites of the Mierzanowice culture (around 2200–1600 BC) are concentrated on loess hills rising above the valleys of Ropotek and Rudnik. They are both cemeteries and large settlements. Particularly valuable results were obtained during research on the cemetery in Szarbia, where as many as 44 graves were found. These findings enable the reconstruction of funeral rite rules from the early Bronze Age.

Chinese Neolithic Burial Patterns: Problems of Method and Interpretation

Early China ◽

10.1017/s0362502800005198 ◽

1988 ◽

Vol 13 ◽

pp. 1-45 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Richard Pearson

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

Pilot Project ◽

The West ◽

Burial Practices ◽

Archaeological Data ◽

Ceramic Vessels ◽

This paper reviews the interpretation of Chinese Neolithic burials by Chinese archaeologists, comparing their approaches to those of some processual and symbolic archaeologists of the West and also of western Marxist anthropologists. Descriptions of recent Chinese burial practices provide ethnoarchaeological comparison. The author concludes that there may have been a shift from “matrilineal” to “patrilineal” organization, but that this shift cannot be documented from archaeological data alone. Exploration of the spatial and symbolic aspects of the burials is advocated. The paper concludes with a pilot project devoted to the statistical discovery of sets of ceramic vessels used in rituals ancestral to those of the Bronze Age.

The Dual Character of the Beaker Invasion

Antiquity ◽

10.1017/s0003598x00038126 ◽

1931 ◽

Vol 5 (20) ◽

pp. 415-426 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

J. G. D. Clark

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

The Body ◽

The Other ◽

Short Paper ◽

Type B ◽

Classic Work ◽

Dual Character ◽

Type C ◽

The One ◽

In his classic work on the Bronze Age pottery of Britain the late Lord Abercromby adopted the old division of the class of beaker pottery into three types originally proposed by Dr Thurnam as far back as 1871. In order that Abercromby may not be misrepresented I propose to quote the essential portions of his definitions. In type A, the ‘ high-brimmed globose beaker ’, ‘ the body is more or less globular ; the upper part, separated from the body by a constriction, frequently very defined, spreads out like the calyx of a flower and forms a brim or neck that almost equals the body in height. The sides of the neck or rim . . . are straight and not recurved at the lip ’. In type B, the ‘ ovoid beaker with recurved rim ’, ‘ there is no distinct demarca- tion between the body and the rim, but the one glides into the other by a gradual curve ’. Finally type C, the ‘ low-brimmed beaker ’, ‘ may be regarded ’, in Abercromby's own words, ‘ as a debased variety of our first type ’.It should be clear already I think that in labelling his types A, B, and C Abercromby has given the false impression that we have three types of beákers, whereas what we really have are two types, of which one has a ‘debased variety’. We therefore suggest that a less misleading classification would be, for instance, A(x), A(Y), and B. This may seem a trifling point but we believe it has helped to obscure the proper recognition of the true dual character of the Beaker invasion of this country. We propose to substantiate the validity of our suggestion in the course of this short paper.

Object biographies

Personifying Prehistory ◽

10.1093/oso/9780198768012.003.0006 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Joanna Brück

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

New Technologies ◽

The Body ◽

Left Hand ◽

Cloth Production ◽

Yellow Ochre ◽

The Relationship ◽

Physical Boundary ◽

In September 1886, John and Richard Mortimer excavated a large barrow at Garton Slack, East Yorkshire (Mortimer 1905, 229). At the centre of the barrow lay the inhumation burial of a young adult male. A flint knife, a clay button, and two lumps of yellow ochre had been arranged behind his head; at his left hand were two quartz pebbles and fragments of two boar’s tusks, while the scapula of a pig had been laid on top of his ribs. One detail of this burial seems particularly alien to contemporary eyes, however. When the body had begun to decompose, his mandible was removed and placed carefully on his chest, and a miniature Food Vessel inserted into his mouth. Here, a pot replaced an element of the human self and the physical boundary between person and object was elided: the open mouths of both pot and body worked as channels through which relationships flowed in processes of communication and commensality. This chapter will explore the relationship between people and objects in the Bronze Age. The Bronze Age saw the introduction of new technologies, notably metalworking, which had a significant impact on concepts of personhood and identity. A greater diversity of materials was employed than in previous centuries, including visually striking substances such as amber and faience, while more ‘mundane’ materials such as bone were used to make a new and wider variety of objects, particularly during the later part of the period. Such objects were incorporated into new contexts too, notably settlements and burials, and our interpretation of these finds—especially those from burials and hoards—has had a significant impact on our understanding of the period. We will start by examining objects from Early Bronze Age contexts, focusing in particular on burials, before moving on to consider what technologies such as metalworking and cloth production can tell us about the construction of concepts of the self in the Middle and Late Bronze Age. During the early part of the period, artefacts such as copper-alloy daggers, bone pins, pottery vessels, and stone tools were buried with the dead.

Prehistoric Soul Beliefs in Northern Europe

Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society ◽

10.1017/s0079497x00003364 ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 60 (1) ◽

pp. 15-26 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Bo Gräslund

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

Iron Age ◽

Northern Europe ◽

Burial Rites ◽

The Bronze Age ◽

Prehistoric burial rites and burial finds ought to be studied also in the light of primitive soul beliefs. It is argued that the customs of submitting prestige grave goods in northern Europe during the Neolithic, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age consistently reflect a pluralistic soul idea with a free soul aimed for the next existence.

The forethought of Themistocles

The Journal of Hellenic Studies ◽

10.2307/630084 ◽

1987 ◽

Vol 107 ◽

pp. 182-187 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

A. J. Holladay

Keyword(s):

Bronze Age ◽

British Museum ◽

The South ◽

North West ◽

The North ◽

The Dead ◽

Middle Helladic ◽

Dead Man ◽

The Bronze Age ◽

Reconstruction of the burial № 2 destruction process at the Chernyakhiv culture cemetery Komariv-1

Materials and studies on archaeology of Sub-Carpathian and Volhynian area ◽

10.33402/mdapv.2020-24-117-130 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 24 ◽

pp. 117-130

Author(s):

Mariana Avramenko

Keyword(s):

Soft Tissues ◽

The Body ◽

Destruction Process ◽

Funeral Rite ◽

Human Bones ◽

Order Part ◽

Last Stage ◽

Food Offering ◽

Individual Human ◽

The article is devoted to the analysis of burial 2 from the Chernyakhiv culture cemetery Komariv-1 (Kelmentsy district, Chernivtsi region). The northern burial, destroyed in ancient time, belonged to a woman. The text provides a description of the archaeological complex, the reconstruction of the original appearance and the gradual reconstruction of the destruction process. Based on the known data about the costume of the bearers of the Chernyakhiv culture, the peculiarities of the funeral rite, the peculiarities of the placement of the grave goods, it was possible to reconstruct the original appearance of the completely destroyed burial. Thanks to anthropological determinations of the position of individual human bones in the burial, it was possible to determine the sequence of destruction of the skeleton and grave goods. After entering the grave pit, the skull was separated. The skull was then placed face down in the center of the grave. After that, the chest was destroyed. The bones of the legs were inserted in a certain sequence (crossed bones, inverted bones, mirror-embedded bones). The last stage of the destruction of the burial was the destruction of the skeleton of the sheep (food-offering) and turning over and breaking the utensils in the burial. After the burial was destroyed, the burial pit remained open. According to the information received, the burial was destroyed after the decomposition of the soft tissues of the body, but before the decomposition of the leather elements of the suit. According to the results of the study, the following conclusions were made: • Even a completely destroyed burial can be reconstructed to its original appearance. • Different areas of the skeleton were subjected to different manipulations. The thorax is destroyed, the skull and bones of the legs are re-inserted in a certain (non-anatomical) order. • Part of the inventory (at least one silver fibula) was removed from the burial, but the main purpose was not looting but the destruction of the burial. • Burial occurred between the decomposition of the soft tissues of the body and the leather elements of the suit. Key words: Chernyakhiv culture, funeral rite, destroyed burials, reconstruction of funeral rite, post-funeral rite.