Overview

Children, Death and Burials assembles a panorama of studies with a focus on juvenile burials; the 16 papers have a wide geographic and temporal breadth and represent a range of methodological approaches. All have a similar objective in mind, however, namely to understand how children were treated in death by different cultures in the past; to gain insights concerning the roles of children of different ages in their respective societies and to find evidence of the nature of past adult–child relationships and interactions across the life course.   The contextualisation and integration of the data collected, both in the field and in the laboratory, enables more nuanced understandings to be gained in relation to the experiences of the young in the past. A broad range of issues are addressed within the volume, including the inclusion/exclusion of children in particular burial environments and the impact of age in relation to the place of children in society. Child burials clearly embody identity and ‘the domestic child’, ‘the vulnerable child’, ‘the high status child’, ‘the cherished child’, ‘the potential child’, ‘the ritual child’ and the ‘political child’, and combinations thereof, are evident throughout the narratives. Investigation of the burial practices afforded to children is pivotal to enlightenment in relation to key facets of past life, including the emotional responses shown towards children during life and in death, as well as an understanding of their place within the social strata and ritual activities of their societies.

Full Product Details

Author:   Eileen Murphy ,  Mélie Le Roy
Publisher:   Oxbow Books
Imprint:   Oxbow Books
Volume:   5
ISBN:  

9781785707124

ISBN 10:   1785707124
Pages:   240
Publication Date:   31 August 2017
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Available To Order  
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Table of Contents

1. Introduction: Approaches to Archaeological Juvenile Burial Eileen Murphy and Mélie Le Roy   2. How Were Infants Considered at Death during the Neolithic Period in France? Mélie Le Roy   3. Perinatal Death and Cultural Buffering in a Neolithic Community at Çatalhöyük Belinda Tibbetts   4. Burying Children and Infants at Kadruka 23: New Insights into Juvenile Identity and Disposal of the Dead in the Nubian Neolithic Emma Maines, Pascal Sellier, Philippe Chambon and Olivier Langlois   5. Children’s Burials in the Eneolithic Cemetery of Sultana-Malu Roşu, Romania Catalin Lazar, Ionela Craciunescu, Gabriel Vasile and Mihai Florea   6. Late Chalcolithic Skeletal Remains and Associated Mortuary Practices from Çamlıbel Tarlası in Central Anatolia Jayne-Leigh Thomas   7. Processed Babies: Early Bronze Age Infant Burials from Bulgarian Thrace Kathleen McSweeney and Krum Bacvarov   8. ‘Missing infants’: Giving Life to Aspects of Childhood in Mycenaean Greece via Intramural Burials Katerina Kostanti   9. Bronze Age Child Burials in the Southern Trans-Urals (Twenty-first – Fifteenth Centuries cal. BC) Natalia Berseneva   10. Juvenile Burial and Age as a Social Category in Funerary Contexts of Pre- and Protopalatial Crete Nathalja Calliauw   11. Geto-Dacian Child Burials in the Second Iron Age Valeriu Sîrbu and Diana-Crina Dăvîncă   12. Out of the Cradle and into the Grave: The Children of Anglo-Saxon Great Chesterford, Essex, England Christine Cave and Marc Oxenham   13. Emotional Act, Superstition or Ritual? – Evidence from Child Burials in the Medieval period. A Case Study from St Clemens Churchyard, Copenhagen, Denmark Jane Jark Jensen   14. Interpreting Cultural and Biological Markers of Stress and Status in Medieval Subadults from England Heidi Dawson   15. Atypical Burial Practice and Juvenile Age-at-death in Later Medieval Gaelic Ireland: The Evidence from Ballyhanna, Co. Donegal Eileen Murphy   16. Interring the ‘Deserving’ Child: The Archaeology of the Deaths and Burials of Children at the Kilkenny Workhouse during the Great Famine in Ireland, 1845-52 Jonny Geber

Reviews

...a collection of valuable contributions put together by researchers from all over Europe. The enthusiasm of the authors for their topics is obvious throughout the proceedings. * IANSA *

...an interesting set of papers contributing new data to our picture of medieval childhood, and a faithful reflection of the papers and discussion that enervated the original conference session. * Medieval Archaeology * The case studies in Murphy and Le Roy offer new evidence and data for a range of archaeological periods, as well as new insights into renowned sites, such as Catahoeyuk, and should be valuable to students and scholars alike. * Antiquity * ...a collection of valuable contributions put together by researchers from all over Europe. The enthusiasm of the authors for their topics is obvious throughout the proceedings. * IANSA * ...this volume would not only appeal to those with a general interest in the diversity of child burial practices over time, but becomes an essential resource for those interested in childhood, death and burial within prehistoric societies. * Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society *

Author Information

Eileen Murphy is a Senior Lecturer in Archaeology in the School of Natural and Built Environments, Queen’s University Belfast. Her research focuses particularly on human skeletal populations recovered from prehistoric Russia and from all periods in Ireland. She is particularly interested in the use of osteoarchaeological information to help further our understanding of the daily lives and experiences of the people who lived in the past, as well as mortuary practices. Dr Mélie Le Roy currently teaches archaeology (ATER) at Montpellier University. She completed her doctorate in biological anthropology at Bordeaux University. Her research concerned the study of the skeletal remains of children and the social consideration of this part of the population through funerary practices, based on the use in GIS in the analysis of funerary settlements.

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