Many people see death as a rite of a passage : a journey to some new place, or a threshold between two kinds of being. Zoroastrians believe that there is a bridge of judgment that each person who...
Sati, the practice of a widow self-immolating on her husband's funeral pyre, remains one of the most controversial and emotive issues in South Asian culture. While some view it as a sacred funerary...
The unforgettable Tana Toraja is a regency located in the picturesque mountains of South Sulawesi in Indonesia. This region is home to the indigenous Torajan people, whose way of life is deeply...
How would you feel placing a mask on your face that was made from a real human skull? Would you feel differently if it were the skull of a family member, or perhaps an enemy? For many ancient people...
Throughout history, many cultures and civilizations created funerary masks as part of their burial customs. The masks were used to represent a deceased individual, to honor them, and to cover their...
In what they refer to as an “exceptional and amazing” discovery, a team of Israeli archaeologists recently unearthed an ancient burial cave within the borders of Palmahim Beach National Park on...
Ancient tombs are fascinating finds, especially when they’re intact. They can provide us with clues on how a person died, social status, burial styles, and funerary rites. The last of these is...
The modern fascination with highways is not as modern as it seems. Throughout history, there have been examples of building and constructing routes, particularly along important trading routes...
In the Middle Ages being dead wasn’t a guarantee you would rest in peace. Researchers have found hundreds of examples of people re-opening graves in cemeteries from Transylvania to southern England...
Located near Zabol in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchestan, the ancient site of Shahr-i Sokhta (“Burnt City”) is one of the largest and richest Bronze Age sites in Iran and the Middle East...
CT scans of an Egyptian mummy from approximately 1,200 BC have exposed a type of mortuary treatment which has not been documented in the Egyptian archaeological record before now. The individual is...
A new study suggests that Europe has been ‘global’ for over a millennium. The evidence for this claim comes from a set of shared cultural practices spread over a wide area in early Medieval Europe...
Who built the Great Pyramid? Was it built by simple Egyptian farmers with mud ramps, or aliens, or a lost society from the last Ice Age? Did the ancient Egyptians inherit this massive stone building...
A shabti is a funerary figurine used by the ancient Egyptians. These statuettes were placed in tombs as grave goods and were believed to function as servants for the deceased in the afterlife...
Excavators in Cyprus have discovered a series of “sensational finds” of death cult artifacts dating to 3,500 years ago, during the Bronze Age. A vessel used as a cult funerary object, a seal with...
Recently, an American professor has for the first time analyzed the First Book of Breathing , a famous ancient Egyptian book that reveals incredible insights into the afterlife. What happens to us...
The historical time period for the mid-9th millennium BC onwards is known as the early Neolithic . At this time in the Near East human iconography began expanding, but archaeological theories to...
Lined up dramatically atop a rocky ridge, the beehive ‘tombs’ of Bat and Al Ayn are two of Oman’s most celebrated prehistoric sites. Little is known about the stone structures, or the culture that...
The Igorots are an indigenous tribe living in Sagada, Luzon Island, Philippines. The Igorots practice unique funerary customs, in which the dead are buried in coffins which are tied or nailed to the...
A tower of silence (known also as a ‘dakhma’) is a type of structure used for funerary purposes by adherents of the Zoroastrian faith. This Zoroastrian practice for the disposal of the dead involves...
Archaeologists in Ecuador have found two buried infants wearing “helmets” fashioned from the skulls of two other children. The ritual complex and funerary platform of Salango on the central coast of...
A magnificent Roman necropolis has been unearthed at Narbonne, in Occitaine, southwestern France. Archaeologists from the National Institute for Preventive Archaeological Research ( INRAP ) have...
Stone cist graves on the Caribbean island of Saba are found to represent a cultural continuity with the burial practices of rural 17th-century British settlers. It is known that since the Bronze Age...
Archaeologists in Egypt have made two remarkable discoveries at the Valley of the Monkeys in Luxor . They have found evidence of industrial areas or zones, where workers lived and worked. Then they...
