THE BURIALS OF ANCIENT CALIFORNIANS IN THE SOUTHERN PENINSULA

 

According to evidence from multiple burial sites of skeletons of ancient inhabitants of California, the funerary customs of at least those who lived in the southern peninsula, from the city of La Paz to the area of Cabo San Lucas, have been discovered.

Firstly, it has been concluded that when one of these inhabitants died, their companions, usually their family and other residents of their village, proceeded to bury them, unlike the Californians further north, whose procedure with the deceased was generally to cremate them (this was written down by the Jesuits who lived with them during the Colonial period).

Researchers who have studied the way these burials were carried out include Ten Kate in 1883, León Diguet in 1905, William C. Massey of the University of California in 1947, Roberto Jiménez Ovando and Zaid Lagunas Rodríguez in 1989, both belonging to the INAH, Harumi Fujita, Alfonso Rosales López, and M. L. Gutiérrez in 1992, and Donald R. Tuoh and Stephen Van Wormer in 1995. All these researchers have left us with documents, scientific articles, and even books in which they wrote extensive records of their conclusions based on the evidence found in the studied burials.

The conclusions they were able to obtain are as follows:

Generally, a burial pit of about 80 cm deep was dug, where objects belonging to the deceased, such as cooking utensils, nets, arrows, feathers, etc. were placed. Also, in burials that were carried out near the sea, a "bed" made up of clam shells was placed.

The body was wrapped in palm leaves in a flexed position (sitting inclined forward with arms around the knees) and tightly tied with cords made from palm or agave fibers. Finally, the body was covered with sand and in some cases placed inside caves, blocking the entrance to prevent scavenging animals from devouring it.

After about 6 to 8 months, the deceased's relatives proceeded to unearth the corpse and separate the bones through the process of disarticulation (separating the joints). Each bone was painted with a mineral substance that gave them an "ochre" color. Finally, the bones were placed again in palm leaves and tied up again to be placed back in their original position.

The conclusions or hypotheses that have been obtained are:

a) The human groups that inhabited this region of ancient California performed some kind of ceremony during the burial process, reflecting some kind of belief about what happened to people when they died.

b) The oldest burials were dated to 400 B.C., which suggests that this type of activity was quite ancient, predating contact with Europeans, regarding a branch of Californian culture concerning their funeral customs.

c) It is believed that the purpose of dismembering the bodies 6 to 8 months after death was due to some kind of belief that the dead "suffered" when placed in the position they were in during the "first" burial. To alleviate their pain, they were unearthed, their bones separated, and then placed back in their original position. A likely explanation for these ideas could have arisen when they observed that some corpses, due to the decomposition process and the gases that formed inside them, began to produce involuntary sounds or movements, which led them to believe that they were suffering or in pain in the position they were in. The movements and sounds produced by bodies in a state of decomposition have been widely studied by forensic science.

Attempts have been made to find patterns in the position in which ancient Californians were buried (orientation of their heads or feet). However, this has been very inconsistent to date, and no coincidences have been found. Burials have also been found where bodies were placed in the prone or supine position without a "second burial" having taken place, leading to the conclusion that not all groups of Californians or settlements shared these funeral customs.

Bibliography:

COSTUMBRES FUNERARIAS EN EL CONCHALITO, LA PAZ, BAJA CALIFORNIA SUR - Alfonso Rosales López and Leticia C. Sánchez García - Centro INAH Baja California Sur.