Funerary Traditions Research Articles

Funeral customs and traditions in Andalusia Social custom and religious tradition

Death is the inevitable end of all human creatures, and it is an inevitable death that awaits every soul and obsession that dominates people’s minds and causes sadness in their souls, and that is because a dear person has taken his breath, left the world and joined the supreme companion, so that sadness and pain begin, the sadness of parting and the pain of farewell. And the Andalusians, like the rest of human societies, were distinguished by their funerary customs and traditions that distinguished them from the rest of the societies. As soon as the conquerors set foot in the Iberian Peninsula, they started constructing cemeteries, organizing them and taking care of them. Therefore, the Andalusian cities witnessed multiple cemeteries whose names were inspired by the names of the saints and the righteous and divided them into: public cemeteries and private cemeteries. Others are dedicated to those who have died of epidemic diseases. And the Andalusians spread their dead and the funeral processions differed according to the status of the deceased. Political circles among the public, which witness humility from them and increase their attachment to them, so they walk on their feet in respect and reverence for the personality of the deceased, and perhaps some of them went riding and disembarking in front of the funeral. I moved to the Far Maghreb, and it seems that they violated what was prevalent in the countries of the East, where wearing black was an expression of sadness for the dead, and the Andalusians also mourned their dead with poetic poems that were dominated by the nature of sadness and pain, so these poems spread in Andalusian society and Andalusian sources were filled with this kind of The poems and the so-called literature of condolences appeared, and the funerary traditions in Andalusia contained scenes of the wills of the dead through which they are buried. We knew these commandments and summarized their religious and funeral implications. And due to the necessity required by the nature of the subject, the researcher resorted to using the descriptive historical method based on linking historical events and facts in order to reach reliable results. The study was organized with an introduction, two sections, and a conclusion. The first topic was devoted to the study of Andalusian cemeteries, highlighting the emergence and organization of these cemeteries. The second topic was devoted to the study of funeral customs and traditions in Andalusia and the innovations and rituals that accompanied them that contradicted the Islamic religion. her to study.

Spectacle of Grief: Public Funerals and Memory in the Civil War Era by Sarah J. Purcell

Reviewed by: Spectacle of Grief: Public Funerals and Memory in the Civil War Era by Sarah J. Purcell Stephanie K. Lawton (bio) Spectacle of Grief: Public Funerals and Memory in the Civil War Era. By Sarah J. Purcell. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2022. Pp. 321. $95.00 cloth; $34.95 paper; $26.99 ebook) Historians of Civil War memory have eagerly anticipated Purcell's project, and it does not disappoint. Americans in the nineteenth century took death seriously and produced an astonishing amount of material about public funerals. Purcell is up to this challenge and incorporates a remarkable number of primary sources, including over three hundred newspapers, surveying the funeral rites and memorial politics for nine prominent Americans, ranging from well-known individuals like Henry Clay, Robert E. Lee, and Frederick Douglass, to nearly forgotten people like Elmer Ellsworth, George Peabody, and Winnie Davis. Purcell states that although public funerals have long been cast as rites of "unity and consensus," they are in fact contested sites of memory creation as participants "advocate for alternative visions of the past" and project "conflicting ideas about the nation onto famous figures whom they mourned" (pp. 5–6). Through such debates about the past, "Public funerals … helped define American national identities" as post-bellum Americans worked to "'reconstitute' the … nation in ways compatible with rival political interests" (pp. 3–4). But rather than a singular memorial tradition, Purcell shows that multiple, often conflicting, strands were combined in the same commemorative events. [End Page 84] Each chapter contains real gems. Purcell's discussion of how Frederick Douglass' "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July" oration was a rebuttal of the eulogies for Henry Clay in July 1852 is eyeopening. The diplomatic wrangling between the British and American governments over who would transport George Peabody's remains back to the U.S. in the wake of the CSS Alabama dispute shows that the political significance of memory is often international in scope. Purcell's attention to the racial lines of division in these ceremonies is superb, but there could be more attention to the less obvious ways gender and class were used to exclude or marginalize lower-class men, immigrants, and women. For example, while white women joined crowds welcoming Henry Clay's body to their cities and female family members sometimes appeared in the processions, women did not march, deliver the eulogies, or sit on the civic committees that planned these events. Only in the South after the Civil War did ladies' memorial associations start to take a role in hosting mourning rites, but they still did not participate in all aspects of public mourning equally with men. Even lower-class white men, such as firemen in New York City, usually walked near the end of funeral processions, not in the chief places of honor, which highlights the fractures of class and whiteness that became more prominent as America entered its Gilded Age. Spectacle of Grief opens promising avenues for future exploration, especially the possibility of further integrating disability studies into Civil War memory. Throughout the book, undertakers tried to prevent corpses from decaying while on public view while eulogists praised their past physical attributes and ignored often lengthy and disabling illnesses. These attempts to hide mortality, even after death, invites collaboration with disability scholars who have argued that illness and disability have never been welcome in the American community. Scholars of Civil War memory or of death and funeral traditions will find this a valuable addition to their bibliographies. History [End Page 85] instructors who teach about any of the book's nine central subjects would benefit from this additional context, and the chapters on Henry Clay and Frederick Douglass/Winnie Davis would work well as a set to assign to upper-division history classes talking about U.S. slavery, race, gender, and politics. Stephanie K. Lawton STEPHANIE K. LAWTON is an assistant professor of history at the University of the Cumberlands. Her research focuses on Greco-Roman influences on presidential funerals in the nineteenth-century United States. Copyright © 2022 Kentucky Historical Society

Pratiques funéraires et recrutement : reprise d’étude des collections osseuses issues des dolmens du Languedoc oriental et sud des Cévennes à la fin du Néolithique

Collective burials were the main and most widespread funerary practice at the end of the Neolithic, beginning of the Bronze Age in the south of France. Megalithic monuments required a huge investment of time and labor. According to ethnographic studies, these monumental tombs are generally built and managed collectively. One can therefore wonder who was buried inside these structures because several archaeological studies indicate that access to these tombs can sometimes be restricted to certain members of the population. Indeed, ethnography highlights that access to certain tombs can be structured by variables such as kinship, social status, etc. While previous studies have mainly focused on the architecture and function of these monuments, this article focuses on the process of deposition of human remains and the characterization of the population buried inside these monuments. Since 2012, a project has been undertaken on the dolmens of the south of France in order to discuss funerary practices and to compare them with data from other archaeosciences to rediscuss the funerary traditions in place at the end of the Neolithic, the beginning of the Bronze Age.

Transformation of the Funeral Rite of the Peoples of Central Asia on the Territory of North India During the Early Iron Age

The article is dedicated to the historiographical analysis of the transformation of funeral rite of the Pamir Sakas, Yuezhi, Indo-Scythians and Kushans in the process of their migration from Central Asia to the territory of Northern India. The purpose of this study is to trace the gradual assimilation of the nomadic peoples of Central Asia with the settled population of Bactria and Northern India, reflected in the funeral rite. The Early Iron Age of Central Asia and Northern India remains little-studied, if to speak about historical and cultural interactions and routеs of the migration wave. This topic needs an objective and deep study based on a thorough analysis and systematization of available historiographical sources. Extreme paucity of publications dedicated to the funerary monuments correlated with Saki-Indo-Scythians and Yuezhi-Kushans in Northern India is one of the main problems. Funeral practices are among the most important indicators of the cultural interaction between different peoples and cultures. The main method of research is a comprehensive approach suggesting involving data from other sciences – epigraphic, numismatic and historical. The chronological framework of the study is from the II century BC, when Yuezhi and Saki began their massive migrations to the west ‒ to the III century AD, when the fall of the Kushan Empire occurred. In the process of migration, the Sakas and Yuezhi adapted to the cultures around them. Thus, part of the Sakas in Bactria adopted Zoroastrianism, burial mounds of the Yuezhi mostly contain products of local sedentary population. On the territory of Northern India, the Indo-Scythians and Kushans adopted the funerary traditions of the local Buddhist population – burning the dead and placing their ashes in special stupas with other relics. It is important to note that their assimilation took place gradually and even influenced the established funeral practice of Indo-Buddhist. For example, single bones and whole skeletons are sometimes found in stupas, and since the Indo-Scythian period, coins have been placed in stupas with other relics. In this regard, the revealing of new sources about the funerary monuments of Northern India is one of the promising directions.

Boulder cenotaphs of Eastern Fennoscandia: the question of one kind of the orthodox funeral rite in the late middle ages

The paper is devoted to the little-studied funeral practice of the Orthodox communities of the White Sea region and Russian Lapland in the absence of a body. The research was based on the results of the authors work in the last two decades. On the island of Kildin in the Barents Sea, on Lake Sredne Kuito in North Karelia and on a small forest lake near the town of Kovdor three original, similar monuments groups of stone structures of unknown purpose have been recorded. The originality and controversiality of these objects requires their systematic study, introduction into scientific circulation and interpretation. Archaeologists, as a rule, carry out only a primary fixation of objects, but excavations do not always allow to determine clearly the purpose of stone piles. Based on the experience of working with such facilities in Karelia and on the Kola Peninsula, it can be argued that they were not intended for economic purposes. A number of common features make it possible to attribute these structures to a group of monuments associated with the Orthodox funeral tradition. This is the orientation of the stone constructions west east, the general location beyond the water, on the periphery of cemeteries, visual similarity with grave mounds of earth or wooden houses of the dead. Presumably they were ground cenotaphs for the drowned a house for the soul in the absence of a body. The spread of the tradition of their creation can be limited to the area of culture of the Russians and Karelians of the Pomerania of the European North. They are tentatively dated to the period of the Late Middle Ages Modern Times and are considered as part of the Orthodox culture of the population of Eastern Fennoscandia. Understanding the idea of these objects is impossible without information on the ethnography of Slavic and Finno-Ugric ethnic groups about the division of the dead into those who died a natural or unnatural death.

The results of the study conducted in 2022 at the necropolis medieval settlement Syganak

A mausoleum is a monument, a funeral building that included a chamber where the remains of the dead were placed. The Turkic peoples have built mausoleums over the graves of their dead ancestors for centuries. Mausoleums were considered the afterlife home of the dead. The erected structures make it possible to determine the social status of people buried in the mausoleum or to which class they belonged. After all, it is known that huge mausoleums were built for famous people, consisting of several rooms, with internal and external walls covered with decorative ceramics. The mausoleums had one or more burials. The graves studied and the materials found in them allow us to determine the status, outlook, way of life, traditions, religious beliefs and burial rites of the inhabitants. For this reason, in this article, we set the task of analyzing the studies conducted in 2022 at mausoleums No. 6 and No. 7 and introducing the data obtained during archaeological excavations into scientific circulation. Conducted scientific research within the framework of this topic made it possible to determine the features of mausoleums No. 6 and No. 7, construction technology and construction time. As a result of a comparative analysis with the mausoleums of this type from adjacent regions, the similarities and differences between the mausoleums of Syganak were determined. In addition, in the article we considered it appropriate to present the history of the emergence and development of mausoleums. In the article, when studying the little-studied history of the formation of mausoleums located in the middle reaches of the Syr Darya River, it is known that mausoleums arose on the basis of the ancient funeral tradition of nomadic peoples living in Central Asia.

The View from the North

During the Neolithic (ca. 6200-5000 BCE), South Caucasian economies basically developed within a fairly secluded environment that afforded only limited relationships with Syrian or Mesopotamian communities. However, a change in interregional dynamics occurred in the course of the 5th millennium, which led to the progressive integration of the South Caucasus into a wider region that included western Iran, eastern Anatolia, the northern Levant, northern Syria and Upper Mesopotamia. This shift resulted in the development of a new interaction sphere that I have called the “Chaff-Faced Ware oikumenè”. As indicated by its name, these interactions are perceptible through the development of similar crafting practices in ceramic production, but common trends in house building and funerary traditions are also noteworthy. Alongside these common trends, it is interesting to note that South Caucasian obsidian starts to be found on a few Mesopotamian sites, sometimes as far as the Persian Gulf. In the South Caucasus as in Upper Mesopotamia, the systematic use of chaff, and the resulting chaff-faced effect, appear in the first half of the 5th millennium BCE. However, while the development of Chaff-Faced Ware in Mesopotamia marks a clear concept change in ceramic crafting between the Ubaid and the post-Ubaid periods, the evidence from the South Caucasus is more ambiguous: the ceramic assemblages known from the Caucasian Early Chalcolithic are technologically diverse; moreover, unlike the pottery from the Ubaid world, they do not form a regionally coherent stylistic repertoire. In any case, the emergence of Chaff-Faced Ware in the Caucasus does not mark a sharp conceptual break with previous ceramic crafting practices, as it does in the Ubaid world. Hence, the increasing commonalities in ceramic productions that develop between the middle of the 5th and the mid-4th millennium BCE in the Caucasus and Syro-Mesopotamia alike give rise to a number of intriguing questions, all the more so as several “diagnostic” ceramic types used in Near-Eastern archaeology to identify “Post-Ubaid” or “Early Uruk” assemblages have been found in a gold or silver version in the Majkop kurgans of northern Caucasia. Following the reflections I first published in 2010 and 2012, this paper reviews the archaeological data recently collected in the Caucasus so as to give a better insight into the significance of the Chaff-Faced Ware oikumenè in an era marked by major transformations.

Tomb S181 in Cyrene and its Doric false peristyle

AbstractSituated on the westernmost corner of the Southern Necropolis, Tomb S181 is an important rock-cut monument, unlike any other thus far known in Cyrene. The presence of a Doric false peristyle running all around the chamber is unique in the context of the Cyrenean funerary culture, as it seems to elaborate and modify the model of the Internal Doric Frieze (seen in famous tombs of the near-by Western Necropolis) in a new, previously unpublished solution. Tomb S181 casts further light on the complicated relationship with the Alexandrian funerary world. This paper describes the tomb and considers it from multiple and different points of view: traditional art-historical comparisons are sought in order to cast light on the chronology but, on the other hand, the display strategies are also analyzed to reconstruct the importance of this monument for the Cyrenean monumental funerary tradition. Tomb S181 is certainly a hybrid entity, the product of a local culture accepting but also deeply modifying Alexandrian influences in terms of architecture and, possibly, also of funerary ritual behaviours. Tomb S181 clearly attests the vitality of rock-cut funerary architecture in Cyrene during the Hellenistic period.

Moving Together

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the subsequent floods in New Orleans, traditional community networks and support systems were in shambles. As neo-liberal forces moved in to privatize vast swaths of society, a clash over gentrification within the city quickly set in. Newcomers to the city pushed former residents – especially Black citizens – out of their traditional neighbourhoods and simultaneously instigated cultural battles locals viewed as anathema to their understanding of home. Amid these disputes, Junebug Theatre company, the oldest Black theatre company in the city, launched a series of solidarity building artistic engagement programmes entitled Homecoming Project to educate the public on local histories. Using Black feminist theories of solidarity, I theorize this project as embodied ‘rememory’ work, utilizing Toni Morrison’s conception of rememory ‘as in recollecting and remembering as in reassembling.’ In working with community members to collect memories and then instilling audiences with these experiences through a neighbourhood-based second-line (a traditional New Orleans roaming dance and music performance that has roots in the city’s jazz funeral tradition), Homecoming Project works as an embodied memory machine. Across the Homecoming Project performances, I articulate how the project built a ‘spirit of solidarity’: a frame I develop to articulate the process of ritual-based group solidarity that acknowledges inter-group tensions while uniting allies through shared experiences of place.

Research works on the burial monument of the time of Jochi Ulus in the Ulytau district

On the territory of the Ulytau district there are many cities, settlements, mausoleums and burials reflecting the material culture of the Ulus of Jochi era. Burial monuments are one of such legacies. The subject of this article is the burial place in the Jochi Khan complex. The paper presents the research results of this monument. The cultural identity of the burial, revealed during archaeological excavations, was identified by comparative methods of studying the external structure and burial traditions. Numismatic examination of the found coin allowed to establish the date of minting and the date of its introduction into circulation. At the same time, an anthropological description was made on the skeleton of the buried woman, and it turned out that she was a woman aged 20–25 years. The time of her life was determined by the radiocarbon dating method and included in the list of monuments dating back to the middle of the 14th century. The absence of any pathological changes in anthropological features and the solemn burial ceremony with clothes suggested that the buried person had a high social status. In addition, opinions were expressed concerning the spiritual values and household rituals of the local population, considering the peculiarities of the funeral tradition. In particular, in the period from the middle of the 14th to the 15th centuries, the foundations were formed related to the predominance of Muslim signs in the tradition of human burial and the preservation of traditions associated with the Tengrian beliefs of the local population.

Sleeping soul: A concept representation of metaphysical anthropology of the funeral traditions of Torajan people

The funeral tradition of the Torajan people is one of the most recognised funeral traditions in the world, a part of Indonesia’s rich indigenous knowledge. However, this particular tradition has been in decline over time because of the alienation caused by the spreading of Christianity. This research aimed to reinterpret metaphysical anthropology of the funeral tradition of the Torajan people using the concept of the sleeping soul from the narration of Jesus in Mark 5:35–42 and Daniel 12:1–3. The research used a qualitative approach with theological and ethnographic research types. The results of this study reveal that the concept of the sleeping soul in the biblical view can reinterpret metaphysical anthropology in the funeral tradition of the Torajan people as follows: (1) souls are eternal in the process of death, (2) souls of the deceased are helpless and (3) the sleeping soul is an eschatological hope for Christianity and Torajan people.Contribution: The aim of this research is to find a Christian metaphysical anthropology doctrine that is cordial to the funeral tradition of the Torajan people. The relationship between the two is that they have the same way of appreciating human existence metaphysically. This finding contributes to Christianity in the preservation of Torajan culture.

Basic Features of Funeral and Memorial Rites in the Forest-steppe Altai in the First Millennium

The article deals with the issues of general theoretical nature related to the problem of determining local cultural traditions. The processes of settling the forest-steppe Altai by the tribes of the Kulaiskaya archaeological culture, which laid the basis for the formation of the Altai variant of the culture, have been briefly characterized. The settlement began in the 4th-3d centuries BC with the infiltration of small groups of the population of the Novosibirsk variant of the Kulaiskaya culture into the local environment, then it was followed by migration flows of representatives of the Sarovskii stage of the Kulaiskaya culture from the territories of the Tomsk Ob region at the end of the 2nd century BC, which led to a change in the culture of the aboriginal population. The formation of the Altai variant of the Kulaiskaya culture took place on the basis of cultural interaction of the alien Kulaiskaya culture population of the Sarovskii stage with the local population belonging to the Staroaleiskaya and Kamenskaya cultures, which led to the appearance of sites of the final Fominskii stage. Chronological line of the turning points of the local cultural traditions (2nd century AD) has been determined in the article. It characterizes the main features of the funeral and memorial rites of the new population that can be considered local from that moment. Those traditions can be seen as basic, the sources of further development and transformation of funeral and memorial traditions of the forest-steppe Altai throughout the 1st millennium.

Раннесарматские погребения могильника Верхний Балыклей I из Заволжья

The paper introduces into scientific discourse the materials of the early Sarmatian burials from the Verkhniy Balykley I kurgan cemetery from the area of the Volgograd Trans-Volga region. This monument was studied in the course of the 1978–1979 expedition organized by the Volgograd State Pedagogical Institute under the leadership of A.S. Skripkin. Materials. The burial includes four mounds located compactly on the banks of the reservoir and one single mound setting far away in the steppe. Eighteen inlet burials of the early Sarmatian time were found in three Bronze Age kurgans. Some burials contained no burial inventory; others did include a variety of grave goods. The funeral rites present a wide range of grave structures: pits with side chambers, simple rectangular pits and catacombs. The southern body orientation of the buried individuals was dominating. In kurgans 5 and 6, a circular arrangement of graves is traced, which is typical for early Sarmatian mounds-cemeteries. Material analysis. An analysis of the grave goods indicates 3rd – 1st centuries BC is the time of construction of most burials in these kurgans, which does not contradict the funeral rite traditions and reveals a range of features characteristic of the nomads of that period. A military burial with a long sword and arrows is one of the most distinguished in its kind. Ceramic material is represented by various stucco forms of pots, an incense burner and a jug. Fragments of mirrors with rollers along the edge and beads were discovered in several burials. Several stone “miniature hammers”, typical for the South Ural grave materials of this period, is also an interesting find. Conclusions. In general, the studied monuments illustrate the burial traditions of the early Sarmatian population of the Ural-Volga steppes of the early Sarmatian time. The finds of pottery samples, previously unknown stone “miniature hammers” in the west of the Volga, allow us to conclude on the cultural proximity of the nomads who left the mounds near the village Verhniy Balykley with the South Ural nomads. Authors’ contribution. In this paper, Anatoly S. Skripkin prepared a descriptive part of the archaeological material; Vladimir I. Moiseev analyzed the funeral rite and the inventory. Mikhail V. Krivosheev drew and presented conclusions on the analysis of the material.

Growing up Gravettian: Bioarchaeological perspectives on adolescence in the European Mid-Upper Paleolithic

Adolescence is a stage of development unique to the human life course, during which key social, physical, and cognitive milestones are reached. Nonetheless, both the experience of adolescence and the role(s) of adolescents in the past have received little scholarly attention. Here we combine a broad interpretative framework for adolescence among prehistoric hunter-gatherers with direct bioarchaeological (burial) data to examine the lives of teenagers in the European Mid-Upper Paleolithic or Gravettian (∼35–25,000 years ago). Comparisons of the burial practices of individuals of different age classes (infant, child, adolescent, adult), as well as between adolescents who died at different ages, reveal some patterns related to adolescence in these communities, including 1) fewer distinctions based on sex among adolescents compared to adults; 2) differences between the sexes in age-at-death within our ‘adolescent’ age class—with females disproportionally dying later—potentially indicating high risks associated with first pregnancy; 3) distinctions in grave goods and diet among adolescents of different ages-at-death which we tentatively interpret as providing an emic perspective on the beginning of adolescence as defined by Pleistocene hunter-gatherers. Nonetheless, our analysis supports long-standing models of a distinct, continent-wide European Mid-Upper Paleolithic funerary tradition, with the burial data expressing social cohesion, rather than social distinctions, between age classes.

EXCAVATION OF THE BURIAL GROUND KARIV I OF ROMAN AGE IN THE WESTERN BUG BASIN IN 2019—2020

The paper highlights the results of research conducted in 2019—2020 at the archaeological site cremation burial ground Kariv I of the Roman period in the basin of the Western Bug River. During the excavations 3 cremation burials were found which perhaps included the remains of one male and two females. Noteworthy is the partially destroyed female burial 12. Rich items of funeral inventory were found there, including the household items, metal costume details, jewelry, including jewelry made of yellow metal. The tilth soil layer contained fragments of glass and ceramic imported utensils, brooches, weapons and horse harness, armour ect. In total 12 cremation burials (including one pair burial) with a variety of equipment were found on the area of 1456 m2 during the entire period of research on the burial ground Kariv I. The remains of thirteen people were found in the burial assemblages: seven men, five women and one adolescent child (infantilis II group). We can suppose that the site may have been a burial place for barbarian elite and members of its inner circle. On the basis of numerous finds (brooches, spurs, tips of drinking horns, amphorae, glass and bronze vessels, etc.), most of which come from closed assemblages, the chronology of the burial ground is ascertained by the second half of the 2nd century CE (phase B2/C1). The people who left the site had mixed cultural traits. The mix of funeral traditions of the Przeworsk culture with notable South Germanic (Suebian), Baltic and Venetian elements can be found on the site. The events of the Marcomannic Wars, during or after which some members of the barbarian coalition tried to leave the troubled areas of the Middle Danube, moving away from Roman political influence in the European Barbaricum, perhaps may be the reason of appearance in the region of the population whom the burial ground belong.

4. Enterrés dans Paris occupé. Les tombes des Juifs dans les cimetières parisiens (1941-1944)

While it is not commonly known, Jews were able to participate in the social conventions surrounding funeral traditions during the Occupation. In her diary, Hélène Berr describes the funeral she attended in broad daylight at Montparnasse Cemetery in 1943. This article discusses which burial methods were available to Jewish people during their persecution in Paris. Are their grave sites still visible in the city’s cemeteries? Do those that remain show evidence of the government’s persecution? Do they indicate that the deceased passed away during the Occupation? What do the graves of the Jewish people who died during this time have to tell us?In Paris, regardless of whether they died “naturally,” i.e. from disease or starvation, or in internment camps, Jews could be: 1) laid to rest by their family in a personal tomb, 2) buried for free by the national community in trench graves, 3) interred by the association representing French Jews within the General Union of Jews in France (UGIF). A common characteristic of the remaining grave sites of Jews who died in the Drancy internment camp is the total absence of any mention of the persecution they faced in France during the Occupation. No inscriptions or any other form of evidence describes their tragic fate. Indeed, their tombstones do not mention the Drancy camp or their status as a prisoner at the time of their death.This article also explores one of UGIF’s unique strategies for burying the dead, namely the use of collective vaults owned by Jewish mutual aid societies. This strategy represented a commonality between two distinct types of Jewish populations, namely French Israelites, who made up the majority of UGIF’s leadership, and immigrant Jews, most of whom came from Eastern Europe. Their funeral traditions differed, as did their preferred places of burial in Paris at the time. Members of the first group were buried in Montparnasse and Montmartre, while members of the second group were buried in the Bagneux and Pantin cemeteries. And yet, during the government-led persecution of Jews and the collaborationist regime, these two groups adopted similar funeral rites by requisitioning vaults owned by Jewish mutual aid societies. The purpose of these organizations was to voluntarily unite Jews from Eastern European cities or their descendants. These individuals agreed to offer mutual aid to all members upon their death through the purchase of a collective and permanent tomb where the remains of all contributors and their families could be interred. In the 19th and 20th centuries, these organizations set up an ingenious system in France that made it possible to evade the French regulations that prohibited this type of collective vault. At the time, only family vaults were allowed.By creating its “burial” service using the funds and vaults of this type of organization, called “La Terre Promise,” UGIF also absorbed the assets of all Jewish associations in France, which had been dissolved after its creation in November 1941. From that point on, UGIF had control over the empty spaces in these collective vaults, which it decided to allocate to interned Jews who had died in the Drancy camp and had no pre-existing vaults.A paradox ensued. Jews who died as a result of the anti-Semitic movement in France, but who had not contributed to or joined these kinds of organizations, were nevertheless buried in these vaults, even though they did not have any ties with them. If descendants of the deceased are around today, what do they know? Victims were able to be re-buried by their loved ones in similar vaults after the war. After several years spent renewing the plot the UGIF purchased for his daughter, who died at the age of 4 as an internee in the Drancy camp, a Polish father who had returned from deportation finally had her body exhumed and re-buried in Bagneux in the collective vault of his village’s mutual aid society, before going into permanent exile in the United States himself. However, the direct descendants, who were cousins of the little girl, did not know she had died on French soil, nor that her current grave, an imposing collective monument, is located less than 600 feet from their family vault in the same cemetery.This example shows how the Jewish graves in Parisian cemeteries (because no Jewish cemeteries exist in France today) are the site of a fragmented remembrance that is separate from the persecution Jews suffered in occupied France.

‘The most difficult time of my life’ or ‘COVID’s gift to me’? Differential experiences of COVID-19 funerary restrictions in Aotearoa New Zealand

ABSTRACT In 2020, the government of Aotearoa New Zealand imposed some of the most stringent funerary restrictions in the world as part of its efforts to eliminate COVID-19. This article explores how people experienced this situation, asking why restrictions that some described as precipitating ‘the most difficult time of their lives’ were described by others as a ‘relief’, ‘blessing’, or ‘gift’. Much existing literature frames funerary restrictions as a distressing assault upon established ways of grieving to which mourners must try to adapt – and in Aotearoa, both the stringency of the restrictions and the means by which they had been imposed did lead to many people finding them challenging. However, for those with ambivalent pre-existing feelings regarding their funerary traditions – such as many in the Samoan diaspora – COVID-19 restrictions afforded both a reprieve from burdensome practices and a much-welcomed opportunity to reimagine their traditions. Funerary restrictions, though disruptive, are thereby shown to have generative potential.

The Political Funeral of Isabella the Catholic in Rome (1505): Liturgical Hybridity and Succession Tension in a Celebration Misere a la Italiana et Ceremoniose a la Spagnola

Based on the interest aroused by royal funerals at the end of the Middle Ages, this paper analyses the obsequies held in the Eternal City on the occasion of the death of Isabella the Catholic (1474–1504)—Queen of Castile and Aragon—in a context of international tension and succession unrest. The papal diaries, diplomatic documentation and Ludovico Bruno’s sermo funebris allow us to reconstruct the liturgical, scenographic and rhetorical display of a ceremony that seduced with its solemnity and elegance, the fruit of a hybridism that combined Spanish and Italian funerary traditions in the Rome of Julius II. The creativity of the Spanish community is thus evident in its ability to convert the Isabelline funeral ceremony into an expression of dynastic power in the context of Spanish–French competition and incipient tensions between the Habsburg and Fernandine courts over the Castilian succession. Only by starting from this intertwining of the political and the liturgical will we be able to understand the transformations undergone by the funeral ceremonial in its passage—still little explored—from late medieval customs to modern scenographies.

Decolonizing Indigenous Burial Practices in Aotearoa, New Zealand: A Tribal Case Study.

Before European contact, Māori disposed of the dead in environmentally sustainable ways. Revitalizing pre-colonial burial practices presents an opportunity for Māori to evaluate current practices and reconnect with their ancient tribal customs and practices. The research question asks: What is the decolonizing potential of urupā tautaiao (natural burials)? Paradoxically, environmentally unsustainable modern tangihanga (funerals) retain the ethos of customary funerary traditions. Urupā tautaiao presents an opportunity for iwi (tribes) to retain cultural integrity in the death space, without compromising Papatūānuku (earthmother). Methodologically, a Māori worldview frames an action research mindset. The study captures a tribal community's exploratory journey into urupā tautaiao.

CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF THE NEWS OF COVID-19 CORPSE SNATCHING PATIENT IN THE I-NEWS

The diction used in the news of corpse snatching of COVID-19 varies and has caused the public to panic. This study aims to show the structure of the media language used in The News of Corpse Snatching of COVID-19 patients in Pasuruan and the factors that caused the hundreds of people attempting to take the deceased's body forcefully. The primary data are the news of corpse snathing of COVID-19 patients in Pasuruan, uploaded on YouTube and the online news media i-News, and comments from netizens in the comments column. In addition, informant interviews were conducted to show the factors causing Corpse Snatching. Critical discourse analysis (CDA) is used for content analysis by describing three dimensions: text, discursive practice, and social practice. It was concluded that the media language used in the news text of the corpse Snatching in Pasuruan tends to use vocabulary that shows negative rather than positive actions. Moreover, the media emphasizes negative actions more than describing solution actions to become government policy steps. Based on informants and studies of the third dimension, hundreds of people who conducted the Corpse Snatching were caused because people hardly accept COVID-19 protocols since they hold Kejawen Islamic funeral traditions.