New Perspectives on Casas Grandes Mortuary Practices:

Summary

The diversity of Casas Grandes mortuary practices has often been cited as strong evidence for hierarchy and political centralization at Paquimé. Initial mortuary analyses argued that variability in grave furniture, corpse treatment, and burial location represented the social identity of the deceased. A central finding of these analyses was that mortuary variability cross-cut age and sex categories, supporting inferences of ascribed vertical status differentiation. In this study, we use recent theoretical perspectives emphasizing the performative aspect of mortuary practices, and new bioarchaeological techniques for age and sex estimation to re-examine the Casas Grandes burial dataset. We also expand upon these analyses by incorporating paleoepidemiological datasets to examine the influence of individual well-being in burial practices. Our results suggest that mortuary practices at Paquime may map onto several social dimensions, including graveside social negotiations by the living and lived identities of the deceased. We discuss the implications of these results for Casas Grandes identity, ritual practices, and social organization.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Moving Forward in Casas Grandes Archaeology   •
• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage