This book investigates the complex relationship between funerary treatment and wider social dynamics through a contextual analysis of human skeletal remains and associated mortuary data from Voudeni, an important Mycenaean (1450-1050 BC) chamber tomb cemetery in Achaea, Greece. Voudeni is one of the most significant sites of Achaea, thoroughly investigated under the direction of the Honorary General Director of Antiquities, Dr Lazaros Kolonas. Over 60 chamber tombs, spanning the entire Late Helladic III period, have been excavated, yielding an unprecedented wealth of biocultural information. This study explores the post-mortem treatment of the body in the Voudeni cemetery, through a novel interpretive approach that transcends unproductive cross-disciplinary divisions. This biosocial approach integrates traditional archaeology, current reflections in mortuary archaeological theory and cutting-edge bioarchaeological methods, primarily focused on funerary taphonomy and archaeothanatology of commingled skeletal assemblages. The author proposes that the most effective route to explore the social dimensions of mortuary data is through an emic understanding of historically situated actions and experiences, both of the living actors, the mourners, and of the dead themselves. Human skeletal remains are used as the primary strand of evidence, both as the object of the acts of the living and the subject of their own lived experiences. Most importantly, this study aspires to show how reconciliation between abstract theoretical advances and empirical biocultural data may be possible, providing the most insightful path to a better understanding of the archaeological mortuary record.

The book provides a thorough background on Mycenaean mortuary research and explores the topic in successive stages: a) theoretical and methodological framework, b) detailed taphonomic analysis and osteological results of 20 tombs, c) multivariate analysis of bio-cultural data across socio-temporal parameters (with special emphasis on the distinction between the palatial LHIIIA-B and the transitional post-palatial LHIIIC period), and d) final synthesis, addressing questions pertaining to changing social conditions in Achaea and key issues of current Mycenaean mortuary research. These include: tomb re-use; form, diversity, sequence and frequency of mortuary activities; mortality profiles; differential inclusion, visibility and funerary treatment of different groups/identities; changes in treatment of the dead body, reflecting shifts in notions of the self and social relationships. The results shed new light on social developments in Mycenaean Achaea, showing that the complex interaction between changing social conditions and mortuary practice is often reflected in subtle, yet meaningful, shifts of emphasis in the post-mortem treatment of bodies and bones, rather than in blatant radical changes.

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Acknowledgements
• 1. Setting the stage
  • 1.1 Introduction
  • 1.2 Chronology and terminology
  • 1.3 The Mycenaean period: a brief review
  • 1.4 Mycenaean Achaea
    • 1.4.1 A general background on Mycenaean Achaea
    • 1.4.2 The LHIII burial customs in Achaea
    • 1.5 The Voudeni cemetery: general background
• 2. Studying mortuary practices
  • 2.1 A review of past approaches to mortuary data
    • 2.1.1 The early approaches
    • 2.1.2 New Archaeology
    • 2.1.3 Criticism of New Archaeology and early post-processual approaches
  • 2.2 Recent and current interpretive approaches
    • 2.2.1 Theory of practice and structuration
    • 2.2.2 Agency and personhood
  • 2.3 Human remains in mortuary studies: past and current directions in bioarchaeology
    • 2.3.1 Studying human remains from archaeological contexts
    • 2.3.2 Contemporary trends in social bioarchaeology
• 3. The state of play in Mycenaean mortuary research
  • 3.1 Introduction
  • 3.2 A brief history of Mycenaean mortuary research
    • 3.2.1 Aegean mortuary research: the first 100 years (late 19th century-late 1970s)
    • 3.2.2 Recent approaches: the fruitful years, 1980-2000
    • 3.2.3 Current research
  • 3.3 Key issues in Mycenaean mortuary research
    • 3.3.1. The architecture: tomb types and their development
    • 3.3.2. Mortuary practice: ritual acts and other activities
  • 3.4 Who is buried in the tombs? Aspects of status, identity, and personhood in Mycenaean chamber tombs
    • 3.4.1 Vertical status
    • 3.4.2 Collective and family identity
    • 3.4.3 Gender and age
  • 3.5 Current bioarchaeological research of the Mycenaean period
• 4. A holistic bioarchaeological approach to mortuary practices
  • 4.1 Basic theoretical premises
  • 4.2 Towards a holistic bioarchaeological approach
  • 4.3 Scope and aims of this study
  • 4.4 Specific questions
• 5. Material and methods
  • 5.1 The material: choice of the current sample and related problems
  • 5.2 The collection of osteological data: recording standards and procedure
  • 5.3 Sex determination and age estimation
    • 5.3.1 Sex determination
    • 5.3.2 Age estimation
  • 5.4 Methodological framework for reconstructing funerary acts in collective tombs
    • 5.4.1 Segregation and individuation of commingled remains
    • 5.4.2 Minimum Number of Individuals
    • 5.4.3 Different aspects of bone preservation: representation, completeness, surface preservation
    • 5.4.4 Anatomical articulations and position of skeletal remains
    • 5.4.5 Types of disposal and other funerary parameters: terminology and classification
    • 5.4.6 Inferring specific secondary acts
    • 5.4.7 Inferring date of tomb contexts
  • 5.5 A brief background to palaeodemographic analysis
  • 5.6 Statistical methods
• 6. Tombs, bones and stories
  • 6.1 Tomb 4
  • 6.2 Tomb 5
  • 6.3 Tomb 9
  • 6.4 Tomb 10
  • 6.5 Tomb 13
  • 6.6 Tomb 14
  • 6.7 Tomb 15
  • 6.8 Tomb 16
  • 6.9 Tomb 17
  • 6.10 Tomb 20
  • 6.11 Tomb 22
  • 6.12 Tomb 24
  • 6.13 Tomb 26
  • 6.14 Tomb 27
  • 6.15 Tomb 28
  • 6.16 Tomb 31
  • 6.17 Tomb 39
  • 6.18 Tomb 40
  • 6.19 Tomb 42
  • 6.20 Tomb 44
• 7. Exploring the data
  • 7.1 The tombs
    • 7.1.1 Spatial variables
    • 7.1.2 Tomb chronology
  • 7.2 The demographic data
    • 7.2.1 Minimum Number of Individuals, age, and sex distributions
    • 7.2.2 Exploring mortality profiles
    • 7.2.3 Sex distributions and age-specific mortality by sex
    • 7.2.4 Exploring frequency of use in different tomb groups
    • 7.2.5 Exploring age and sex distributions in different tomb groups
  • 7.3 Types of funerary disposal and preservation patterns
    • 7.3.1 Characteristics of Voudeni’s tomb contexts
    • 7.3.2 Preservation patterns
    • 7.3.3 Distinguishing the character of ambiguous tomb contexts
    • 7.3.4 Exploring age and sex distributions in contexts of different type of disposal, date, and location
  • 7.4 The funerary practices
    • 7.4.1 The assessment of specific secondary acts: bone removal to outside the tomb and differential bone retention
    • 7.4.2 The burial attributes of primary and disturbed primary contexts
• 8. Understanding funerary practice
  • 8.1 Bioarchaeological reconstruction of funerary practices in LHIII Voudeni
    • 8.1.1 Formation process of diverse skeletal assemblages
    • 8.1.2 The diversity of funerary practices: specific acts of primary and secondary treatment of bodies and bones
    • 8.1.3 Assessing frequency and sequence of funerary events
    • 8.1.4 Diversity in funerary practices across time
    • 8.1.5 Tomb characteristics and funerary practices
  • 8.2 Demographic aspects of funerary diversity
    • 8.2.1 Understanding Voudeni’s mortality profiles
    • 8.2.2 Demographic differences between the LHIIIA-B and LHIIIC periods
    • 8.2.3 Differential funerary treatment across sex and age
    • 8.3 Seeking meaning in funerary practice
  • 8.3.1 The motivation for interference with past remains: surpassing the ritual-practical dichotomy
    • 8.3.2 Bodily fragmentation and enchainment practices
    • 8.3.3 Associations between tomb attributes and vertical status differentiation
    • 8.3.4 The place of children in mortuary practices at Voudeni
  • 8.4 Mortuary practice in its historical context
    • 8.4.1 Continuity and change: the main distinctions between the LHIIIA-B sand LHIIIC mortuary practices at Voudeni
    • 8.4.2 The LHIIIC conceptual shift in mortuary practice at Voudeni
    • 8.4.3 The relationship between shifts in mortuary practice and wider social developments: some concluding remarks
    • 9. Towards a social bioarchaeology of the Mycenaean period
• Appendix: Supplementary information
• Bibliography