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dodge one 1242 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 17:31
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I'm no Ellery Queen, but a shaft 120 feet deep? Sounds like a water well to me. If any remains were found at the bottom, I'd suspect they was murdered and chucked down it when no one else was looking ! Or were our ancestors above such shenanigans?
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tiompan 5758 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 17:33
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tjj wrote: Littlestone wrote: Burl takes excarnation for granted, mentions Catal Huyuk platforms, so you're saying that the idea of excarnation is just an idea? though to be fair it happens in lots of places so it could easily have happened here as well, thats how they explain four timber posts here as platforms.... Good point. There are very practical reasons why excarnation was practiced in Tibet however, and that's the lack of fuel for cremation and the (frozen) hardness of the ground for burial. If excarnation was practice here it may have been for religious not practical reasons - though folks back then may have preferred to put their feet up during the winter months rather than digging a grave or plodding out to find extra wood for a pyre :-) Mmm! Interesting ... I never thought about the climate having an influence on how burials took place but of course it makes sense. Some time back I went into a small museum at Lulworth Cove where the display showed illustrations of excarnations - apparently always at a high point of land (hill, clifftop). It seems a little passe to say it now but I used to think that was a possible use for Silbury Hill (processional path to the top) - for important people like tribal leaders. Just thinking aloud again. tj Geology also has a part to play ,some burials on the Aran Isles are very shallow ,Synge mentions the burial of a drowned sailor encroaching on another a generation earlier and only just below the the top soil . How did they know the excarnations took place at these points ? Sounds like artistic/archaeo licence .
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Branwen 824 posts |
Edited Jan 10, 2010, 17:39
Jan 10, 2010, 17:38
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Placement was too carefully postured in the one's Ive read about. Most were animal and votive offerings. Bones and carvings. Most didnt have the tree. I remember another book saying they weren't used as wells, but can't remember why they knew this now. If I google without "celtic" with just shaft burials, I'm getting links to other cultures too. I dont mind a bit of artistic licence, as long as it's stated that's what it is. A "perhaps" or "maybe" thrown into some books might have saved me a lot of bother.
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tiompan 5758 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 17:40
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dodge one wrote: I'm no Ellery Queen, but a shaft 120 feet deep? Sounds like a water well to me. If any remains were found at the bottom, I'd suspect they was murdered and chucked down it when no one else was looking !
Or were our ancestors above such shenanigans?
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tiompan 5758 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 17:41
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tiompan wrote: dodge one wrote: I'm no Ellery Queen, but a shaft 120 feet deep? Sounds like a water well to me. If any remains were found at the bottom, I'd suspect they was murdered and chucked down it when no one else was looking ! Or were our ancestors above such shenanigans? The burial shaft on martin green's farm was something like 25m .
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dodge one 1242 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 17:57
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I speculated a bit about the bones and votive offerings. Much like today's people throwing pennies into wishing wells...I'd think such things might be typical finds. But the bodies? Was it typically just 1 body? That's what had me thinking of quickly disposed of murder victims. Either way, what alot of trouble to take as a burial or offering. My practical side says a hole that deep is only going to be dug for a well. Also another question comes to mind...did the body have any sort of special back fill on top of it {IE; stones} before the tons of clay and dirt? That would certainly indicate a purposeful internment. This is a curious subject and the first I've gotten to hear of it.
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Branwen 824 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 19:14
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dodge one wrote: I speculated a bit about the bones and votive offerings. Much like today's people throwing pennies into wishing wells...I'd think such things might be typical finds. But the bodies? Was it typically just 1 body? That's what had me thinking of quickly disposed of murder victims. Either way, what alot of trouble to take as a burial or offering. My practical side says a hole that deep is only going to be dug for a well. Also another question comes to mind...did the body have any sort of special back fill on top of it {IE; stones} before the tons of clay and dirt? That would certainly indicate a purposeful internment. This is a curious subject and the first I've gotten to hear of it. Backfilled very quickly after the shaft was dug seems to be the reason they know it wasn't used as a well. I saw one googling that was a whole body. So many celtic customs revolve around waters. Silver and gold art works, broken, sacrificed to the waters, and rediscovered centuries later in treasure hoards always speaks to me of the origin of the wishing well. Why break it? If not to let the soul of the artwork escape and take our wish with it to the gods? Custom survived as putting white stones into the waters in the highlands, if you were too poor to use yer siller. Murder brings us back to the Wearie O Wells which I did to death on another thread and added to the Arthur's Seat page about the Wearie Well too. Traditional gaelic death song has a refrain (bheir me Oh) sounds like "Weary Oh" and means "Woe is Me". (listen to the corries sing a version from 1542. Most wearie well legends are about murders. The backfill was immediate, meaning not used for a well. The placement of bones and votive offerings like little hound sculptures together suggests more than just a murder to me. Sometimes its whole skeletons, sometimes just a few bones, possibly being reinterred from somewhere else, or at least, defleshed. Most bones are animal ones though. Would you be murdering an animal, adding a carving of the animal and a few human bones if it was murder?
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dodge one 1242 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 19:38
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Branwen, thanks for taking the time for your as always insightful replies. It's very intriguing that our ancestors dug so deep a hole for a burial. I guess i figured that a well could have lots of votive type things pitched into it over it's lifetime of perhaps many years. A body being tossed in incidentally is probably just my macabre fanciful thinking! But if it's certain that these holes were back filled immediately, thoughts of the after/Under world seem most likely. Don't take too much time about it, but if you do come across any articles you find relevant regarding these Celtic shaft burials, please do post a link. Best regards D1
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FourWinds 10943 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 19:44
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Branwen wrote: I dont mind a bit of artistic licence, as long as it's stated that's what it is. A "perhaps" or "maybe" thrown into some books might have saved me a lot of bother. It would be lovely wouldn't it! I hate it when people express pet theories as absolute fact, but maybes don't sell books, I'm afraid. I always take care to place words like possibly, maybe, perhaps or occasionally the odd probably into sentences in my books where either I or the source is conjecturing. Perhaps that's why I don't sell loads of books :-)
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Gwass 193 posts |
Jan 10, 2010, 20:12
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That's a shame. It's surprising the henge and alignment both turn out to be bogus. They seemed categorically sure of both in the show and had the surveying equipment confirming it. Also re the henge it had been dug before and classified as a henge. I wonder why/how it turned out not to be the case and how come your contact agreed with it at the time. I'm not being funny but I've heard a few things here which contradict what seems to be scientific proof on the show and am genuinely interested.
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