No description available.

Heart burial is a funerary practice that has been performed since the early medieval period. However, relatively little scholarship has been published on it in English. Heart burial began as a pragmatic way to preserve a body, but it became a meaningful tradition in Western Europe during the medieval and early modern periods. In an anthropological context, the ritual served the needs of elites and the societies they governed. Elites used heart burial not only to preserve their bodies, but to express devotion, stabilize the social order and advocate legitimacy, and even gain heaven. Heart burial assisted in the elite Christian, his or her family, and society pass through the liminal period of death. Over the centuries, heart burial evolved to remain relevant. The practice is extant to the present day, though the motivations behind it are very different from those of the medieval and early modern periods.

Thesis (M.Dev.) --University of Limpopo, 2007. / The main purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of the funeral costs on households. This study was of greater importance in that it makes the public to be aware of ever increasing costs and how this is fundamentally damaging the economic situation of the poor people in the Thulamela Municipality. The major findings of the study were that there existed a gap between what was socially expected at a funeral and what the households could afford in arranging for the funerals. The households used maximal amounts of what they got from burial societies and block contributions. The funerals were not only attended by relatives and friends assisted by undertakers as this would minimize the amounts used, but were attended by multitudes of people who, at the end of the funeral, expected to be entertained with food and drinks. An interesting feature that emerged related to gender was that, in the area of study, women had more to say pertaining to issues of funeral arrangements. In most cases, they were the ones who joined burial societies and gave each other practical support at the time of death. This study is qualitative in nature. The qualitative approach helped the researcher to gain in-depth knowledge about the impact of death in the specific area of study. To explore the topic fully, the researcher conducted focus group discussions and interviews. The respondents in the focus discussions were selected from the households that had bereavement within the last five years directors of five funeral parlours in the municipality were also interviewed. The study highlighted the influence of funeral directors on the expenditure of households in the Thulamela Municipality. The study outlines the misappropriation of funds accumulated over a long period of time in a one day funeral service. The study further revealed the role played by formal insurers, funeral parlour, burial societies and funeral schemes that deceive households in the Thulamela Municipality part of their little income. / Not listed

This study focuses on the assessment of the depositional activity that occurred in six caves of the Petexbatun region of the Peten, Guatemala through a quantitative analysis of the human skeletal material recovered from them. Five of these caves are associated with the site of Dos Pilas; the sixth cave (Cueva de Los Quetzales) is located beneath the site of Las Pacayas. The cave is an important aspect of the Maya worldview, as evidenced in the artifactual and skeletal material found in caves by archaeological exploration. My study is specifically focused on the assessment of the primary and/or secondary burial of Maya dead within these caves via analyses of the relative skeletal element frequencies, the minimum and probable number of individuals, and the identification of human cut marks. Based on these lines of evidence and data from preliminary reports, between 100 and 150 individuals of both sexes and various age groups were primarily deposited/buried in these caves. Secondary activity may be inferred based on evidence of human-made cut marks on several elements. There is no osteological evidence to support the hypothesis of human sacrifice. I was unable to determine the status of the individuals deposited in the caves. The best interpretation is that several types of depositional activity occurred within these caves over time.

No description available.

This study focuses on the assessment of the depositional activity that occurred in six caves of the Petexbatun region of the Peten, Guatemala through a quantitative analysis of the human skeletal material recovered from them. Five of these caves are associated with the site of Dos Pilas; the sixth cave (Cueva de Los Quetzales) is located beneath the site of Las Pacayas. The cave is an important aspect of the Maya worldview, as evidenced in the artifactual and skeletal material found in caves by archaeological exploration. My study is specifically focused on the assessment of the primary and/or secondary burial of Maya dead within these caves via analyses of the relative skeletal element frequencies, the minimum and probable number of individuals, and the identification of human cut marks. Based on these lines of evidence and data from preliminary reports, between 100 and 150 individuals of both sexes and various age groups were primarily deposited/buried in these caves. Secondary activity may be inferred based on evidence of human-made cut marks on several elements. There is no osteological evidence to support the hypothesis of human sacrifice. I was unable to determine the status of the individuals deposited in the caves. The best interpretation is that several types of depositional activity occurred within these caves over time.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.