One of the most intriguing sections of the Bard textbook so far was the small section where Bard discusses mortuary practices and their link to social status and wealth. Bard writes about Lewis Binford’s 1971 study of burial practices. Binford studied and reviewed the mortuary practices of 40 different communities. The societies studied were not the same, but were a variety of different types of communities with different backgrounds, cultures, and a wide range of mortuary practices. Binford used his research to support his claim that grave goods had a direct correlation with social status and hierarchy.
I am guilty of having believed this to be absolute truth. It made sense to me that the more prominent members of a society would be buried with more grave goods and more valuable items. For instance, I my grandma had a very low income and could have been considered to be of a ‘lower level’ of society (I know this sounds terrible, but I am just being brutally honest). My grandma did not have a lot of ‘stuff’ and she was not buried with anything of monetary value — she just wore her favorite lava lava and that was it. On the contrary, my great grandmother was more well off and would have been considered a more prominent member of society, and she was buried in a beautiful and expensive red skirt and blazer suit. She had pearls on her neck and rings on her fingers — things that are considered valuable in our society.
However, Bard challenges Binford’s thoughts and observations. Bard argued that when looking at burial sites — and trying to analyze the grave goods and their importance — that the culture and specific beliefs of that society need to be taken into account. The importance of material items may be crucial in one culture but not the next. They may also change based on the values of a group of people. My grandmothers — who I mentioned above — are perfect examples of this. My great grandmother who was financially set and who lived in a more affluent community her whole life was buried with items of monetary value. These valuable grave goods were a cultural norm for the society she interacted with. On the contrary, my Grandma Sina was buried with nothing except the clothes on her back. Grandma Sina had a very different culture and background though. She was born and raised in Samoa until she ran away when she was a teenager after being forced into an arranged marriage with a much older man. She made it to Hawaii but lived a life of poverty because she had no family or resources here in the states. She loved her family and freedom from her (sad) life in Samoa and those were her treasures in life. Therefore, the fact that she was buried in her favorite dress and nothing else, wasn’t just because she was poor or lower class. It was because she did not value material items. She did have some items of value in her home, but they were not her prized possessions. Her family and freedom were. According to Samoan tradition (she was the daughter of a High Chief) she was supposed to be brought back to Samoa and buried. However, because she valued her family and she felt that she related culturally more to the United States than Samoa, she had wanted to remain here. I believe my grandmas help to prove Bard’s point that mortuary practices have to be carefully scrutinized and that the culture, values, and backgrounds of the individuals (or groups of people) need to be evaluated to truly have a good idea what the grave goods and rituals represent. Things do not always represent the individual or their class.
Mortuary practices of ancient Egypt always catch peoples attention, myself included. There’s something so mysterious and otherworldly about how they treated their dead compared with todays society. How our society treats our dead, and death in general, is very crude and undramatic, often with little ceremony besides that of a funeral or a wake. In ancient Egypt the culture was obviously much different, but they also treated their dead in a much more respectful manor, their religion and society operated much differently than ours today.
It was wonderful to learn about your grandmothers, you have such a rich history in your family. When considering mortuary practices I would think it would be obvious to view them within the scope of the rest of the society or culture being studied as that would give clues on as to why those practices are being practiced. Material goods were important to ancient Egyptians, and are important to many Americans in todays culture. Obviously our mortuary practices are not as elaborate, but often it seems that people today are buried with their prized possessions, whether that be a piece of jewelry or a photo of their family, it does not matter. It was interesting reading about the comparison of your two grandmothers, it does show an obvious difference between individual and societal mortuary practices. I can now only think of what I would like to be buried, or cremated, with, what items my family will define my life with. It’s an interesting thought, if not a depressing one.