Article2010

Lapita Burial Practices: Evidence for Complex Body and Bone Treatment at the Teouma Cemetery, Vanuatu, Southwest Pacific

Frédérique Valentin · Stuart Bedford · Hallie R. Buckley · Matthew Spriggs

54 citations0/0 files storedThe Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology

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Forensic Anthropology and Bioarchaeology Studies Death, Funerary Practices, and Mourning Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies

Abstract

Excavation of the 3,000-year-old Lapita cemetery of Teouma (Efate, Central Vanuatu) has allowed the first detailed investigation of mortuary practices of these initial colonizers of the Vanuatu archipelago. Focusing on one component of funerary practice: the adult corpse and bone treatment of 25 mortuary contexts recovered at the site during excavations in 2004 and 2005, the present study reveals that beyond a complex procedure common for all the deceased, there is marked diversity of funerary behavior. Utilizing current knowledge and practice regarding the method of field anthropology or archaeothanatology, including the chronology of joint disarticulation sequences, we were able to establish the following practices: treatment of corpses by inhumation in a container—pit or wrappers—not immediately filled with sediment, followed by exhumation of the skull and other bones of the upper part of the skeleton, and secondary deposition of bones, including the cranium. The identified variations reflect particular attitudes toward human remains which might be connected to the social position of the deceased and/or individual choice.

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References

1999Human Skeletal Remains: Excavation, Analysis, Interpretation 2000The archaeology of death and burial 1978Human skeletal remains 1990L'Anthropologie « de terrain » : reconnaissance et interprétation des gestes funéraires 2006The Teouma Lapita site and the early human settlement of the Pacific Islands 1892The Melanesians, Studies in Their Anthropology and Folk-Lore 2007Understanding the Circumstances of Decomposition When the Body Is Skeletonized 1935Malekula: A Vanishing People in the New Hebrides

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2014Evidence for Social and Cultural Change in Central Vanuatu Between 3000 and 2000 BP: Comparing Funerary and Dietary Patterns of the First and Later Generations at Teouma, Efate 2018Controlled experimental observations on joint disarticulation and bone displacement of a human body in an open pit: Implications for funerary archaeology 2011Vanuatu Mortuary Practices over Three Millennia: Lapita to the Early European Contact Period 2018Ancient DNA and its contribution to understanding the human history of the Pacific Islands 2019

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