Many perceptions of Mississippian see a collection of highly stratified, chiefdom-level societies. While this is not immediately incorrect, there are inaccuracies in these assumptions. It is important to recognize the impact of secondary burials on the context of a body, as well as analyzing burial data against both data from the site it had been collected from as well as from other Mississippian sites. By doing so, one can -- hopefully -- find the conclusion that most accurately represents the truth of the traditions practiced by indigenous peoples instead of the conclusion that makes the most sense to one’s personal experiences. Moundville was the first significant use of statistics in archeology. This data revealed how the top 5% of …show more content…
The grave would be dug and prepared by women paid to do so by the deceased’s family. The body was prepared by a priest and buried with all of their belongings, including horses, if the deceased possessed one and did not specify otherwise. Burials were highly reflective of one’s status, impacting “burial location, grave size, and burial architecture” (O’Shea 74). Pawnee is considered to be a stratified society, “first on the basis of descent and secondarily through personal achievement” (O’Shea 72). This system was highly rigid, and no amount of personal achievement could supercede one’s status from birth, although it was expected that contributions to the group matched one’s status within higher ranks (O’Shea …show more content…
At the same time, those reburying the dead would present new goods, many from those not from the moving village, that would be added to the graves. This increase the number of artifacts present, and if someone analyzing these graves did not know that such an event occurred, it may be interpreted that the deceased were of a very high status. Since bones appear sexless to those who aren’t trained to notice it, male and female bodies may be mixed up, depending on how carefully the bodies are moved, meaning that while men and women are only originally buried with their respective sex or with certain goods, reburial may change how the data appears. Along this same path, old burials are likely mixed with new, so trends in how bodies are oriented and the goods they are buried with may be lost with each reburial. Ultimately, it is important to consider each burial within its culture’s specific context before attempting to make any assumptions about mortuary practices. By failing to note how reburials impact the context of a grave, especially mass reburials like the Huron Festival of the Dead, important information about these mortuary practices is lost due to one’s own
For historians, the colonial period holds many mysteries. In Written in Bone, Sally Walker tells the story of America's earliest settlers in an interesting way, by studying human remains and bones. Sally walker works alongside historians as they uncover the secrets of colonial era gravesites. Written in Bone covers the entire process, from excavating human remains to studying the burial methods and how scientists, historians and archeologists go about this. Readers will be amazed by how much detail these processes uncover, such as gender, race, diets and the lifestyles of many different people. The reader will began to see the colonial era in a new way.
About 800 years ago, a great civilization inhabited the land in west Alabama, located along the Black Warrior River, south of Tuscaloosa. It encompassed a known area of 320 acres and contained at least 29 earthen mounds. Other significant features include a plaza, or centralized open area, and a massive fortification of log construction. The flat topped, pyramidal mounds ranging from three to 60 feet, are believed to have been constructed by moving the soil, leaving large pits that are today small lakes. As major ceremonial center, up to 3000 people inhabited the central area from 1200-1400 AD. An estimated 10,000 lived around the stockade, which surrounded three sides of the civilization (Blitz 2008:2-3; Little et al 2001:132).
“Tracing a single Native American family from the 1780’s through the 1920’s posed a number of challenges,” for Claudio Saunt, author of Black, White, and Indian: Race and the Unmaking of an American Family. (pg. 217) A family tree is comprised of genealogical data that has many branches that take form by twisting, turning, and attempting to accurately represent descendants from the oldest to the youngest. “The Grayson family of the Creek Nation traces its origins to the late 1700’s, when Robert Grierson, a Scotsman, and Sinnugee, a Creek woman, settled down together in what is now north-central Alabama. Today, their descendants number in the thousands and have scores of surnames.” (pg. 3)
The article was an enjoyment to read. It provides an insider's view of what goes on in the mortuary, where not many people can access. It deals with a subject which people do not usually seek information on but are nonetheless intrigued by. The style lessens the formality of the subject, which makes it less scary to deal with. The descriptive language is effectively used. The expression of the author's feeling and thoughts encourages empathy from the reader with the author.
There are three parts in West’s book; the first part focuses on the sociological, ecological and economic relationships of the plains Indians, starting with the first establish culture of North America, the Clovis peoples. Going into extensive detail pertaining to early geology and ecology, West gives us a glimpse into what life on the early plains must have looked to early peoples. With vastly differing flora and fauna to what we know today, the early plains at the end of the first ice age, were a different place and lent itself to a diverse way of life. The Clovis peoples were accomplished hunters, focusing on the abundance of Pleistocene megafauna such as earlier, larger forms of bison. Though, little human remains were found, evidence of their s...
"Creole Materialities: Archaeological Explorations Of Hybridized Realities On A North American Plantation. " Journal of Historical Sociology 23.1 (2010): 16-39. Academic Search Complete. 27 Apr. 2014. The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'. Web.
Corbett, B. (1999). Last call in Pine Ridge For the Lakota’s in White Clay, Nebraska, death is on the house. Retrieved February 6, 2005, from http://ishgooda.org/oglala/whitcla1.htm
Barnett, James. The Natchez Indians: A History to 1735. Jackson: University of Mississippi Press (2007).
1. Martin Carver, Sutton Hoo Burial Ground of Kings? (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998), xi.
Grandview Cemetery is located on 1528 Leeds Ave. Monessen, PA in Westmoreland County and is owned/run by The Epiphany of Our Lord Church (Grandview Cemetery). The Epiphany Church used to be called St. Cajetan’s and the it is unclear exactly when the parish was founded thus it is not clear when the cemetery was first created either. The best guess that can be made is that it was founded in the late 1800s or the early days of the 1900s. Although it is unclear when the cemetery was established it is still in use today and has a lot more diversity in the Catholic lineages it has taken in since it was conceived. This development occurred in when the original five Catholic Churches with Monessen where formed into one
The validity of the conclusion could be better with more evidence from different cemeteries around the country. Therefore due to the limitation of evidence it is possible to lead to inaccurate results. It was also difficult to decipher what some of the inscriptions were as the gravestones have been eroded by the weather (figure 5-5.4).
Despite the fact that it has been over two decades since the passage of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), the issues of ethical conduct revolving around repatriation are still highly relevant today. The political implications of repatriation show just how delicate the issue can be for both archaeologists and tribal members. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (Public Law 101-601; 25 U.S.C. 3001-3013) describes the rights of Native American lineal descendants, Indian tribes, and Native Hawaiian organizations with regard to the treatment, repatriation, and nature of Native American human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and objects of cultural patrimony, referred to communally in the statute as cultural items, with which they can show a relationship of lineal descent or cultural affiliation. Repatriation legislation
In Minnesota’s Cottonwood County, Jeffers Petroglyphs stands on rose-colored Sioux quartzite overlooking tallgrass prairies and the Little Cottonwood River. The site is a sacred and spiritual location that has preserved centuries worth of history through images carved on rock surfaces, called petroglyphs. The Minnesota Historical Society and the Indian Advisory Committee along with elders and other members from the “Cheyenne, Ioway, Dakota, Lakota, and Ojibwe tribes, whose ancestors lived and traveled in the prairie-lake region [for the last 350 years], along with the Oto, Ponca, and Omaha,” have all been working together to preserve Jeffers Petroglyphs since 1966 (Connolly). For many Natives, Jeffers Petroglyphs holds cultural and historic knowledge as well as evidence of the presence of Natives living on the land as far back as 5, 000 - 7,000 years ago.
By 1000 CE a society that was distinctly Caddoan had emerged. Recent excavations have exposed more cultural diversity within the region than had previously been expected by scholars, predominantly in sites along the Arkansas River. In addition to the lack of wooden palisades often associated with the major Middle Mississippian towns, Caddoan Mississippian towns also possessed a more asymmetrical arrangement of earthen mounds and accompanying villages than their counterparts to the east (Caddoan Mississippian culture).
As portrayed above, poverty is the misery of life. “No gravestone, no name, no identifying mark of any kind. The burying-ground is merely a huge waste of hummocky earth, like a derelict building-lo...