Emergent Spirituality: The Anthropomorphic and Zoomorphic Ossuaries of Peqi’in (Upper Galilee, Israel)

Summary

The creative and diverse mortuary practices of the Chalcolithic period in the Southern Levant demonstrated a profound departure from the single-person, intramural interments of the earlier Neolithic periods. During the Chalcolithic, formalized structures and subterranean chambers were constructed for corpse depositions that were more complex in nature. Of particular interest, many of these structures exhibit innovative tendencies that allude to portraiture. Iconographic motifs are not exclusive to the Chalcolithic period, but the artifacts from the site Peqi’in mark a significant shift from the preceding Neolithic. Accordingly, this paper examines these anthropomorphic and zoomorphic ossuaries as a lens to symbolic expression – figurative representations – in mortuary contexts. Specifically, I consider the associated meaning of exaggerated facial features – the uniquely modeled eyes, ears, mouths, and snouts – as well as the accompanying head accouterments as a means to interpret what appears to be an increased concern for realism. Using new criteria for classification and comparative examples from contemporaneous sites such as Shiqumim, Giv’atayim, and Azor, it endeavors to deconstruct this assemblage in the broader context of secondary cave burials and examine what these mortuary changes represent in terms of death and belief on a site-specific and regional level.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage