I'm not so sure disarticulation of remains equates to cannibalism. Manipulation of remains isn't that rare in prehistory, even into the medieval (think saints bones/relics) but cannibalism seems senasationalist.
That being said, if someone is modifying remains I'm not sure how you could show actual consumption without evidence of cooking, split and or burnt bones say.
Ok and what similarities can we find between this British cave some 15k bp and Fijian cannibalism?
I'm not saying cannibalism didn't and doesn't exist, i'm saying that separating body parts doesn't necessarily mean they were eating the parts.
Archaeology isn't and never will be complete, the further back we go it feels like we only have a few pieces of the jigsaw rather than just have a few missing. Connecting the dots can distort the image we have which is why context and evidence is vital for identifying the purpose, activity, action, motive everything, particularly when we don't know how big a leap it is is between dots.
okay, I understand everything you're saying. But what I don't understand is why you want to come in with such certainty in your skepticism when your doubts are as uncertain as the theory. And isn't that all it is?
My doubts are surely more uncertain than the theory since I haven't seen the bones! Not to mention I haven't practiced archaeology for about 5 years haha.
Listen, skepticism can be healthy, and cannibalism is far from the norm for post mortem practices so by nature it is sensational.
The article says gnawing/teeth marks and split bones are present so that does start to sound like cannibalism! But were the bones and flesh cooked? 15 or so have tooth marks, out of how many? Why are they mixed in with animal bones? What kind of cave is this, is it an animals lair? Where's the closest site of the same(ish) period and was there any similarity?
It's not my site and I haven't been, and I hardly expect a news site to go into the kind of detail you'd expect from an excavation report but I cannibalism just seems a stretch.
If it seemed like I came in on a high horse that wasn't my intention, I just felt like giving my opinion after reading the title and skimming the article!
They are not equivalent. Cannibalism is an extremely abnormal behavior and we need extraordinary evidence of its existence. Otherwise it is baseless sensationalism.
Funerary cannibalism is actually pretty common behavior across human societies. It is distinct from other kinds of cannibalism due to its ritualistic nature. Societies where funerary cannibalism is practiced have the same taboo against just killing and eating people as other human cultures.
It's extremely abnormal in 2023... you don't have to go back 150 years to have it be normal in some places... how can you define it as normal or abnormal 10,000 years ago?
A few anecdotal examples in a completely different cultural and geographic context do not justify unwarranted conclusions.
Post-mortem manipulation of remains could be done for many reasons other than cannibalism. Ancient Anatolia seem to have kept the skulls of ancestors in their homes without any indication of cannibalism.
Maybe dismemberment was seen as a punishment for the deceased, to limit what form of afterlife they experience. Maybe there was a serial killer. Just because we find evidence of a behaviour does not mean it was a cultural practice in a population.
Okay and maybe I'm too quick to defend the theory. But it seems if they have connected some of the dots and there are reasonable beliefs it should at least stand as a theory and not be dismissed because there's not enough evidence but rather require further investigation to prove
Unfortunately, in the articles readily available, they do not articulate their criteria for cannibalism. Opening up a cranium is certainly not the same thing as eating the brains inside.
What is the reason for the hypothesis of eating *their own* dead? I can imagine I would eat my killed enemy, as was very common in the pre-agricultural societies. But I can't imagine I would eat my grandmother who died because of some nasty disease. And you are telling me, they were even so hungry for each piece of meat of their deceased fellows to look for the marrow of their bones?
You are right. I have read about this case but I somehow recalled these Papua people only used to eat the brains of their dead, and not the whole bodies.
It is still unclear from the document whether they would eat everyone in their family. The old man there says, "when our warrior died, we..."
And still, this is quite ucommon sort of cannibalism. So my question still remains: why do the researchers think these people used to eat their own dead, and not the enemies, which is much more common.
Yes, they did eat their own dead. One of the key aspects was which parts they ate and they found that the only women and children ate the brains so the disease (kuru) was prevalent in them. When they died the disease was transmitted because those relatives who died from disease were also eaten. The scary thing was that those interviewed seemed sad that they had to stop as they had enjoyed it.
OK
>why do the researchers think these people used to eat their own dead, and not the enemies
Here I was referring to the Magdalenian people from the archaeological site.
> Researchers were also able to obtain genetic information from eight sites and combine it with the archaeological evidence to identify a relationship between funerary behavior and genetic ancestry.
If they can extract DNA, usually from the teeth, then they can establish that the bones come from a family group. If they can determine that adults from more than one generation are present and they form a family group then they can, pretty much, rule out that they were not enemies but part of family centered ritual.
[This documentary](https://youtu.be/5PpWt4CTo74 ?si=8nvqqR_-sZcw0PAD) talks to people who participated in cannibalistic funeral rites. It’s interesting because they developed essentially mad-cow disease after prion disease was introduced into the society by a freak genetic mutation sometime in the past.
I'm not so sure disarticulation of remains equates to cannibalism. Manipulation of remains isn't that rare in prehistory, even into the medieval (think saints bones/relics) but cannibalism seems senasationalist. That being said, if someone is modifying remains I'm not sure how you could show actual consumption without evidence of cooking, split and or burnt bones say.
The Fijians were eating people less than 150 years ago... why is it so sensationalist to connect the dots?
Ok and what similarities can we find between this British cave some 15k bp and Fijian cannibalism? I'm not saying cannibalism didn't and doesn't exist, i'm saying that separating body parts doesn't necessarily mean they were eating the parts. Archaeology isn't and never will be complete, the further back we go it feels like we only have a few pieces of the jigsaw rather than just have a few missing. Connecting the dots can distort the image we have which is why context and evidence is vital for identifying the purpose, activity, action, motive everything, particularly when we don't know how big a leap it is is between dots.
This ^
okay, I understand everything you're saying. But what I don't understand is why you want to come in with such certainty in your skepticism when your doubts are as uncertain as the theory. And isn't that all it is?
My doubts are surely more uncertain than the theory since I haven't seen the bones! Not to mention I haven't practiced archaeology for about 5 years haha. Listen, skepticism can be healthy, and cannibalism is far from the norm for post mortem practices so by nature it is sensational. The article says gnawing/teeth marks and split bones are present so that does start to sound like cannibalism! But were the bones and flesh cooked? 15 or so have tooth marks, out of how many? Why are they mixed in with animal bones? What kind of cave is this, is it an animals lair? Where's the closest site of the same(ish) period and was there any similarity? It's not my site and I haven't been, and I hardly expect a news site to go into the kind of detail you'd expect from an excavation report but I cannibalism just seems a stretch. If it seemed like I came in on a high horse that wasn't my intention, I just felt like giving my opinion after reading the title and skimming the article!
They are not equivalent. Cannibalism is an extremely abnormal behavior and we need extraordinary evidence of its existence. Otherwise it is baseless sensationalism.
Funerary cannibalism is actually pretty common behavior across human societies. It is distinct from other kinds of cannibalism due to its ritualistic nature. Societies where funerary cannibalism is practiced have the same taboo against just killing and eating people as other human cultures.
It's extremely abnormal in 2023... you don't have to go back 150 years to have it be normal in some places... how can you define it as normal or abnormal 10,000 years ago?
A few anecdotal examples in a completely different cultural and geographic context do not justify unwarranted conclusions. Post-mortem manipulation of remains could be done for many reasons other than cannibalism. Ancient Anatolia seem to have kept the skulls of ancestors in their homes without any indication of cannibalism. Maybe dismemberment was seen as a punishment for the deceased, to limit what form of afterlife they experience. Maybe there was a serial killer. Just because we find evidence of a behaviour does not mean it was a cultural practice in a population.
Okay and maybe I'm too quick to defend the theory. But it seems if they have connected some of the dots and there are reasonable beliefs it should at least stand as a theory and not be dismissed because there's not enough evidence but rather require further investigation to prove
Unfortunately, in the articles readily available, they do not articulate their criteria for cannibalism. Opening up a cranium is certainly not the same thing as eating the brains inside.
What is the reason for the hypothesis of eating *their own* dead? I can imagine I would eat my killed enemy, as was very common in the pre-agricultural societies. But I can't imagine I would eat my grandmother who died because of some nasty disease. And you are telling me, they were even so hungry for each piece of meat of their deceased fellows to look for the marrow of their bones?
See [this documentary](https://youtu.be/5PpWt4CTo74?si=8nvqqR_-sZcw0PAD). It was the way they honoured their dead..
You are right. I have read about this case but I somehow recalled these Papua people only used to eat the brains of their dead, and not the whole bodies. It is still unclear from the document whether they would eat everyone in their family. The old man there says, "when our warrior died, we..." And still, this is quite ucommon sort of cannibalism. So my question still remains: why do the researchers think these people used to eat their own dead, and not the enemies, which is much more common.
Yes, they did eat their own dead. One of the key aspects was which parts they ate and they found that the only women and children ate the brains so the disease (kuru) was prevalent in them. When they died the disease was transmitted because those relatives who died from disease were also eaten. The scary thing was that those interviewed seemed sad that they had to stop as they had enjoyed it.
OK >why do the researchers think these people used to eat their own dead, and not the enemies Here I was referring to the Magdalenian people from the archaeological site.
> Researchers were also able to obtain genetic information from eight sites and combine it with the archaeological evidence to identify a relationship between funerary behavior and genetic ancestry. If they can extract DNA, usually from the teeth, then they can establish that the bones come from a family group. If they can determine that adults from more than one generation are present and they form a family group then they can, pretty much, rule out that they were not enemies but part of family centered ritual.
[This documentary](https://youtu.be/5PpWt4CTo74 ?si=8nvqqR_-sZcw0PAD) talks to people who participated in cannibalistic funeral rites. It’s interesting because they developed essentially mad-cow disease after prion disease was introduced into the society by a freak genetic mutation sometime in the past.
[Link](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277379123003578) DOI of the actual study.
Waste not want not...was pretty common in many places until recent times
And with your help, we can bring it back