Mortuary | American Journal of Archaeology

Karaağaç Tumulus: An Iron Age Elite Burial from Rural Western Phrygia

website — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 22:12:32 +0000

This article presents the first comprehensive study of the Karaağaç Tumulus, a Middle Phrygian (ca. 800–540 BCE) monumental tomb located at the northwestern edge of the Central Anatolian Plateau, modern Türkiye. Stratigraphic and material evidence indicate a multiphase use, including an Early Bronze Age cemetery, a Middle Iron Age tumulus with elite burial, and Late Antique graves. The architectural form and contents parallel those of Gordion and Ankara, suggesting a high-status interment, possibly linked to regional governance during Midas’ reign. Its remote location—far from known urban centers—challenges traditional models of centralized Phrygian authority and supports recent interpretations of a multipolar political structure of Iron Age Phrygia. The discovery of diverse goods, a Phrygian name inscribed on a jar, and the presence of bronze situlas further attest to elite cultural practices. Despite modern looting, salvage excavations have yielded valuable archaeological and archaeometric data, which places the tumulus between Gordion Tumuli MM and S-1 (740–690 BCE). It also emerges as a key site for understanding the diversity of Phrygian funerary traditions, political organization, and regional interaction in central Anatolia during the late eighth century BCE.

Content warning: Readers are advised that this article contains a photograph of human remains.

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Aššur’s Newcomers: Evidence for the Maintenance of Population in Imperial Assyrian Capitals Through Resettlement Events

website — Fri, 12 Sep 2025 20:27:15 +0000

Assyrian urban centers in northern Mesopotamia experienced massive growth during the Neo-Assyrian period (950–612 BCE) of the Iron Age. Aššur was the original seat of the Assyrian empire, acting as the center of Assyria’s religion and culture even after the capital was shifted elsewhere in the ninth century BCE. During the height of the empire in the eighth and seventh centuries, the occupied area of Aššur expanded to almost double that of the preceding centuries. Historically, it is known that deported populations from across the empire were resettled in the Assyrian heartland, with Aššur being one of the most common destinations. That many of the newcomers to Aššur were foreign-born is indicated in the evidence from archival records of several houses in the Outer Town. Furthermore, nonlocal mortuary practices are present in these newly occupied areas more so than anywhere else in the city. I propose that the significant increase in urban density at Aššur—and the subsequent expansion and restructuring of its urban area—resulted from the purposeful resettlement strategies of the Assyrian kings in the first millennium BCE. Such sudden, enforced population increases radically changed the urban fabric of all central Assyrian urban centers, not just Aššur.

Content warning: Readers are advised that this article contains a photograph of human remains.

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Mortality Crisis at Akhetaten? Amarna and the Bioarchaeology of the Late Bronze Age Mediterranean Epidemic

website — Fri, 12 Sep 2025 20:27:15 +0000

The question of whether the ancient Egyptian city of Akhetaten (14th century BCE; modern Amarna) was affected by an epidemic has long been debated. Evidence such as the deaths of several Amarna-period royals within a short period and the identification of Egyptian soldiers as the source of the plague that affected the Hittite empire in Muršili II’s plague prayers has been cited to support the idea. More recently, the presence of burials containing multiple individuals in the Amarna cemeteries, high disease frequencies, and some unusual demographic characteristics have been used to support claims of an epidemic. This paper surveys the debate and then discusses archaeological and demographic hallmarks of epidemics identified by others at cities with historically documented disease outbreaks. Through this lens of expectation, we integrate archaeological and bioarchaeological data from ongoing work at Amarna’s cemeteries with pertinent data from long-running settlement excavations at the site to assess whether there is empirical evidence of epidemic disease at Amarna and the wider implications of this. We conclude that when the evidence is considered as a whole, there is little to currently suggest Akhetaten was affected by a mortal epidemic.

Content warning: Readers are advised that this article contains a photograph of human remains.

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Dying in the Mines: Necropoleis and Funerary Practices During the Late Antique Period in the Smaragdos (Egyptian Eastern Desert)

website — Tue, 17 Jun 2025 15:22:10 +0000

This article documents the Late Antique necropoleis in the Smaragdos, a region known in antiquity for its emerald mines. The study analyzes the features of the necropoleis and tombs identified in them within the general context of the funerary practices of the desert communities that lived in the Eastern Desert between the fourth and the seventh centuries CE. Hundreds of these tombs have been identified along the wadis and in the surrounding hills. Unfortunately, it is extremely hard to find any undisturbed tombs, as they have almost all suffered from severe looting. Far better evidence has been recovered since the 19th century from the necropoleis in the Sudanese part of the Eastern Desert, although those have predominantly been royal and elite tombs. The present overview of burial areas and practices in the Smaragdos region of the Egyptian Eastern Desert is based on an archaeological survey conducted by the Sikait Project in the Wadi el-Gemal National Park from 2018 to 2024, which studied more than 800 graves in several necropoleis in this region, mainly from the Late Antique period. It offers one of the most extensive reviews ever conducted of funerary practices in this period in the Eastern Desert.

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Beyceğiz Tumulus: A Middle Phrygian Cenotaph near Gordion

website — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 19:54:35 +0000

The Beyceğiz Tumulus, 11.5 km east of the Phrygian capital of Gordion, was the target of multiple looting attempts, prompting a salvage excavation from 2013 to 2017 by the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations in Ankara in partnership with the Gordion Archaeological Project. Remote sensing indicated a chamber-shaped anomaly near the tumulus center, which became the focus of excavation. The anomaly turned out to be a stone platform built on bedrock, which proved to be the center of radiating guide walls that separated sediment fills used for the original construction of the tumulus. No trace of any kind of burial or ritual deposit was found. The most reasonable explanation is that the tumulus was a cenotaph. The ceramics found inside it provide a terminus post quem for its construction in the late eighth century BCE. The construction technique of the tumulus demonstrates the importance of design, planning, logistics, organization, and cooperation. Its prominence in the landscape around Gordion suggests that it was both a memorial and a visual marker on a major road leading from Gordion to the Phrygian citadel of Hacıtuğrul.

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The Early Iron Age Cemetery of Ḥorvat Tevet: Life and Death in a Rural Community in the Jezreel Valley

website — Mon, 01 Apr 2024 04:00:00 +0000

Recent salvage excavations at Ḥorvat Tevet in northern Israel revealed a cemetery consisting of at least 25 burials dated to the Iron I period (11th–10th centuries BCE). In this article, the burial practices employed in this cemetery are analyzed in order to shed light on the social complexity, economy, and funerary rituals of a rural community in the Jezreel Valley in the period between the collapse of Egyptian rule in Canaan and the formation of early monarchic Israel. Based on the finds in the graves and variations between graves, it is concluded that the site was home to a community characterized by minimal wealth accumulation, limited social division, and few long-distance trade contacts, though there are implications that the site had connections with the Beth-Shean Valley. This evidence is then contextualized in light of mortuary data from the Late Bronze II–Iron IIA Jezreel Valley in order to define aspects of continuity and change during the transition from Canaanite city-states to territorial polities.

Content warning: Readers are advised that this article contains photographs of human remains.

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Aedicula Tombs and Statues in Rome: Reconsidering the Monument of Eurysaces

website — Sat, 01 Jul 2023 04:00:00 +0000

This article revisits the well-known monument of Eurysaces in the context of the Roman funerary landscape. By focusing on its structure and original context, our research demonstrates that the monument, far from being a unicum, instead conformed to contemporary commemorative practices and was in many ways typical. Analysis of comparable monuments and funerary areas, as well as characterization of the concrete used, indicates that the monument of Eurysaces was originally an aedicula tomb with a superstructure, now missing. This reconstruction allows for a more convincing and traditional positioning of the relief images known as “Eurysaces and his wife” at the crowning level of this structure. While our research focuses on the monument of Eurysaces, an important and unexpected result has been the likely identification of several full-length portrait reliefs whose distinctive features suggest that they belong to a previously unrecognized corpus in Rome: aedicular statues. This designation explains the characteristics differentiating them from freestanding statues and helps fill the lacuna of evidence for Rome’s once robust group of funerary structures and ornamentation. The identification of these aedicular statues, in turn, reiterates the fact that aedicula tombs were once popular in the city’s funerary landscape, as they were across the Roman empire.

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Defying Death: A New Interpretation of the Tomb of the Bulls, Tarquinia

website — Fri, 01 Jul 2022 04:00:00 +0000

The wall decoration of the Tomb of the Bulls (540–520 BCE) at Tarquinia is a well-cited example of Early Archaic Etruscan tomb painting, incorporating imagery from Orientalizing iconography and combining it with a new emphasis on figural representation emanating from the East Greek world. Most previous scholarship has suggested that the tomb’s paintings cannot be read coherently and that they stand alone in the broader, more intelligible, tradition of Etruscan wall painting. This paper offers a fresh reading of the tomb’s imagery through tracing the possible prototypes that the artist and patron used for formulating the iconography. Central to this reading is a consideration of the architecture of the tomb and the design of the imagery in relation to the architecture. New interpretations are proposed for the Achilles and Troilos scene and for the two representations of sexual activity on the rear wall of the tomb’s antechamber. The paintings pertain to broader concerns relating to fertility and fecundity, which were critical issues in an aristocratic society. When the tomb is interpreted considering the influences underpinning its creation, namely vase painting and architectural iconography, it is possible to determine a coherent and rational message.

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The Project ArAGATS Kasakh Valley Archaeological Survey, Armenia: Report of the 2014–2017 Seasons

website — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 04:00:00 +0000

During four field seasons spanning 2014 through 2017, Project ArAGATS (Archaeology and Geography of Ancient Transcaucasian Societies) expanded our long-term research on the origins and development of complex political systems in the South Caucasus with a comprehensive study of the upper Kasakh River valley in north-central Armenia. The Kasakh Valley Archaeological Survey employed both systematic transect survey of 43 km² and extensive satellite- and drone-based reconnaissance to accommodate the complex topography of the Lesser Caucasus and the impacts of Soviet-era land amelioration. Though our survey was animated by questions related to the chronology and distribution of Bronze and Iron Age fortifications and cemeteries, we also recorded Paleolithic sites stretching back to the earliest human settlement of the Caucasus, Early Bronze Age surface finds, and historic landscape modifications. Concurrent to the survey, members of the ArAGATS team carried out test excavations at select settlement sites and associated burials, and a series of wetland core extractions, with the goals of affirming site occupation sequences and setting them within their environmental context. This report provides an overview of the results of these multidisciplinary activities.

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Negotiating Infant Personhood in Death: Interpreting Atypical Burials in the Late Roman Infant and Child Cemetery at Poggio Gramignano (Italy)

website — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 04:00:00 +0000

The Late Antique (ca. 450 CE) infant cemetery uncovered at Poggio Gramignano near Lugnano in Teverina (Italy) has been interpreted as a catastrophic death assemblage associated with an acute epidemic of Plasmodium falciparum malaria and a resulting episode of increased infant mortality. Previous research has noted the unique mortuary ritual associated with these burials but has not adequately considered the social implications of the nonnormative burial of the infant and even fetal dead. This paper considers 10 newly uncovered burials of infants and one child from the cemetery, analyzed in situ using an archaeothanatological approach to separate postdepositional taphonomic change from the social and ritual dimensions of intentional funerary behavior. The mortuary treatment provided to these individuals suggests a possible fear of the dead, and more significantly, maternal grief and a desire for remembrance that contrasts with Roman cultural expectations surrounding the mourning of infants. The treatment of these individuals in death provides valuable and specific insight into the attitudes of this rural community’s shared stress surrounding unexplained illness, infant death, and traditional beliefs in an era of significant cultural and social transition.

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