Posted on 02/02/2022 11:31:40 AM PST by Red Badger
Researchers excavating 500-year-old graves in southern Peru have unearthed 192 human spines threaded onto reed posts.
Describing this remarkable discovery in the journal Antiquity, the authors say this unusual assemblage of human vertebrae may have provided a means for indigenous people to reconstruct dead bodies damaged by European grave robbers.
The skewered spines were recovered from burial sites in the Chincha Valley, where the local community was decimated by famine and disease epidemics following the arrival of Europeans.
According to the researchers, the Chincha population declined from over 30,000 households in 1533 to just 979 half a century later, and many of the dead would have been ritually buried along with precious items made of gold.
It is therefore telling that all of the vertebrae-on-posts were dated to between 1450 and 1650 CE, a period when European colonialists raided and destroyed large numbers of indigenous graves in the region.
“Looting was primarily intended to remove grave goods made of gold and silver and would have gone hand in hand with European efforts to eradicate Indigenous religious practices and funerary customs,” explained study author Dr Jacob Bongers in a statement.
“These 'vertebrae-on-posts' were likely made to reconstruct the dead in response to grave looting,” he said, adding that these oddly assembled human spines “represent a direct, ritualized, and Indigenous response to European colonialism.”
Vertebrae-on-post. Image: Jacob L. Bongers This theory is backed up by radiocarbon dating suggesting that the threading of these vertebrae onto reed posts was carried out after the initial burial, while further archaeological evidence supports the idea that local indigenous cultures were concerned with the integrity of dead bodies.
For instance, the authors mention that Incan child sacrifices often involved “non-bloody” killing techniques such as “strangulation or live burial, allegedly in the belief that nothing ‘incomplete’ should be offered [as a sacrifice] to the sun.”
They also note that the Chinchorro people, who inhabited the nearby Atacama Desert several millennia earlier, displayed a similar interest in keeping dead bodies intact, and developed the first known mummification techniques anywhere in the world. To maintain the rigidity of these mummies, the Chinchorro often threaded wooden sticks through their vertebrae.
Another spine on a reed post, this time with the skull attached. Image: Jacob L. Bongers Based on all of this evidence, the study authors conclude that the vertebrae-on-posts discovered in the Chincha Valley represent a continuation of this practice of preserving the wholeness of dead bodies, and was conducted in order to reconstruct corpses that had been destroyed by looters.
More broadly, they say that such practices reflect the funerary customs and beliefs of ancient South American cultures, for whom “body parts continued to live social lives long beyond biological death.”
INCAN RINO PINGY!....................
Posting a thread about threading a post. Nice...
😂👌😎...................................
All cultures are equal. Even ones that rip the hearts out of people and put their spines on a pole.
Just think. These advanced cultures are flooding across our borders and going to school with your kids. Niiice@
“Incan child sacrifices often involved “non-bloody” killing techniques such as “strangulation or live burial, allegedly in the belief that nothing ‘incomplete’ should be offered [as a sacrifice] to the sun.”
Such noble savages.
Is this today’s “What Can We Blame On White People” article?
LOL. Not this sh** again!
But of course—not a shred of evidence but hey, let's sling mud at Europeans. These people are bat sh** crazy, howling at the moon crazy.
It my humble opinion, these are the remnants of Inca cannibal human kebabs roasted over an open fire.
Tut’s tomb curse was nothing compared to what I’ll have.
“For instance, the authors mention that Incan child sacrifices”
From a meme I can’t find right now: “Greetings indigenous folk, we are here to tell the Good News about your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Umm, why are you ripping that man’s heart out?”
Is 500 years ago now considered “ancient?” Joe Biden was just starting out in politics back then, so I get it and all.
Women and Minorities hardest hit
Yawn. Diseases were rampant everywhere during the Little Ice Age. It ain't a "European" thing. Asia and Africa also had horrible problems with diseases then. It's absurd to think that indigenous Americans would somehow not have horrible diseases too if it weren't for those meddling Europeans.
Yup. Columbus got to Peru in 1450 and the first thing he did was start desecrating graves ...
It my humble opinion, these are the remnants of Inca cannibal human kebabs roasted over an open fire.
***************
Yeah, but it’s still white people’s fault....because
It’s like making a necklace. Who wouldn’t do that when you find a bunch of cool trinkets that can be strung together? It’s human nature to have fun with found objects like this. Of course it became a tradition somewhere and elsewhere than mentioned. We do it out of instinct and innate curiosity with seashells,flowers, etc. to this day.
Ezekiel connected them dry bones....
The Delta Rhythm Boys explain it here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYb8Wm6-QfA
Well done.....and you will be!
“It is therefore telling that all of the vertebrae-on-posts were dated to between 1450 and 1650 CE, a period when European colonialists raided and destroyed large numbers of indigenous graves in the region.”
Does he mean the people died between those years? Fourteen fifty would have too early for Europeans to have done any graverobbing.
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