Monday, March 19, 2007

Do You Know Where Your Head Is?



More interesting science news...

Some cultures in the early days of colonization of the islands of the Pacific Ocean may have practiced the custom of removing the heads of their ancestors before burial and keeping them, then reburying them sometime later with the body of one of the person's descendants. Archaeologists discovered this by digging up decapitated corpses buried with heads not belonging to them. In some cases the heads came from different islands than where they were found, allowing researchers to determine ancient migration routes.
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13 comments:

  1. Quitmoanez11:33 a.m.

    F-ck, people are wierdos.

    :)

    I actually think I know that guy!

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  2. Lorne Roberts11:51 a.m.

    in some distant dream of yr ancestry, perhaps.

    this is truly fascinating. ancient migration patterns through matching up heads to their original locations? jeez, man... that's awesome.

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  3. Anonymous2:02 p.m.

    This blog has been getting a lotta head lately.

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  4. D. Sky Onosson3:51 p.m.

    Ha!

    P.S. The head pictured is NOT one of the 'finds', but rather an image of a shrunken head I got off of Wikipedia.

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  5. cara4:48 p.m.

    Where's your head at...

    While I find this picture pretty gross I'm intrigued nonetheless; so how do they know that the heads are from different islands anyways?

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  6. D. Sky Onosson8:33 p.m.

    They did DNA testing. From the article: "At present we don't have enough background data to enable us to say where someone came from in the Pacific, only that they didn't come from the island where they were found," Spriggs said. "Currently, 4 of about 18 individuals tested so far show signs of having been born elsewhere."

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  7. D. Sky Onosson11:22 p.m.

    Oh, and I misstated the findings a little bit. They actually believe that the people were buried heads intact, then subsequently dug up and the head removed. Only after that, and much time had passed, was the head reburied with its new owner.

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  8. cara11:14 a.m.

    Sort of a ritualistic mystical archaeology...digging up the past and constructing a story.
    Then REPEAT

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  9. D. Sky Onosson11:34 a.m.

    Do we humans do anything else?

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  10. Quitmoanez2:17 p.m.

    Nope.

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  11. Lorne Roberts4:03 p.m.

    indeed the answer is nope.

    it is what we do.

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  12. Lorne Roberts4:04 p.m.

    a ritualistic mythical archaeology,

    cara calls it.


    wowsers.

    ReplyDelete
  13. D. Sky Onosson5:08 p.m.

    Hmmmmmm... this is truly giving my head a lot to think about.

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