Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain
A
recent study by Dr. Angelina Locker published in
the Journal of Anthropological
Archaeology implemented bioarchaeological methods to determine if the
secondary burial remains found within a non-elite Late Preclassic (300 BCE–250
CE) could relate to ancestry, placemaking, and movement beliefs.
Typically, secondary burials of skulls,
arm bones, and teeth are viewed through a lens of violence and sacrifice in
ancient Mesoamerican societies in which such practices were prevalent. However,
from ethnohistoric and historical accounts, we also know that the pre-Columbian
societies had complex beliefs about the soul, ancestors, and the afterlife.
In the Maya belief system, specifically,
the soul could be divided into four separate parts. "Baah," which
means the self represented by the head, and represents one's life force.
"Ik'" represented the breath of the soul and was associated with
wind, jade, and teeth. "Ch'ulel" was the essence which resided in the
heart and blood, and finally, "wahy" were companion spirits,
typically animals, who would die after their human counterpart passed on.
Since an ancestor's soul did not
necessitate their entire body to be present, parts of it could be used to
communicate with their descendants, such as the skull, mandible, teeth, or arm.
However, typically when such remains are
found secondary to a primary burial, they were interpreted as evidence of
ritual violence, offerings, and sacrifices either for the primary deceased,
gods, or buildings.
However,
Dr. Locker's study contributes to discussions contesting all such findings as
being the result of violence or sacrifice.
"There
is a lot of variability in the Maya era. There are many examples of tooth
caches (of lots of teeth, often a collection of premolars), extra mandibles, or
skulls included in graves. Individuals missing their skulls, of burials with
just bundled long bones (like leg bones or arm bones), or of just finger bones.
"Many
bioarcheologists have contested using sacrifice as a catch-all to explain the
placement of secondary burials. This paper contributes to that discussion and
focuses on the placement of mandibles and teeth."
To
do this, Dr. Locker examined the non-elite burial recovered on the periphery of
the Dos Hombres site, Belize. The site was once a major urban center with a
population of 10,000 to 15,000 people.
Archaeological site of Dos Hombres and location of the RBCMA in northwest Belize. Credit: Journal of Anthropological Archaeology (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.jaa.2025.101681
Archaeological
excavations, however, only revealed 21 burials, belonging to a total of 35
individuals. Of these, 17 were recovered outside the core settlement, including
a burial containing three individuals forming part of the Dancer Group. The
Dancer Group was a rural commoner household around 1,55km west of Dos Hombres.
"There were three bundled burials
within the Dancer Group—Burial Episodes 1, 2, and 3. My paper focused on Burial
Episode 2. Episodes 1 and 3 were not included, unfortunately, because I did not
have access to them. When I sampled the ancestral burials for my dissertation
research, I sampled burials that were available to me and curated at the
University of Texas," says Dr. Locker.
Initially, this grave had been
interpreted as a primary burial containing the sacrificial remains of other
individuals.
However, Dr. Locker offers an
alternative explanation based on the bioarchaeological results and context of
the burial.
The primary remains belonged to a young woman, buried together with a grave marker and the remains of mussel feasting deposits. Two additional individuals were placed in her grave, represented by teeth; these were a 20- to 34-year-old individual and a 30- to 40-year-old individual.
Source: Ancient
Maya burial study challenges human sacrifice theory, points to acts of
placemaking
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