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Breath, Animacy, and Death

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Bodies, Ontology, and Bioarchaeology

Part of the book series: Bioarchaeology and Social Theory ((BST))

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In Tewa cosmology, the dead are different kinds of entities that are conceptually distinct the living. No longer persons, corpses required special handling since they intra-act with the village’s materialized cosmology as vibrant objects. Rather than treating corpses as the remains of living individuals, de-centering the body explores the transformations and entanglements of corpses as xayeh. In this chapter, I first focus on issues of animacy and assemblages relative to the Tewa world. I then consider how corpses as xayeh were animated by the affordances of objects and spaces. Exploring the Puebloan concept of breath, I articulate how connections among bodies as xayeh, natural objects, and other beings were situated relative to the underworld. Decentering bodies also highlights how the vibrancy of these transformed entities blurs the distinction between the living and the dead.

Pueblo doings … are predominantly concerned with the material interconnections between people, animals, rivers, mountains, corn, architecture, stones, and so on. There is no future orientation, no elaborate preparation for the soul’s afterlife, no cult of named ancestors; significantly, there is very little focus on mortuary traditions at all, just unadorned bodies returned to the earth in simple pits.

(Fowles, 2013: 189).

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Notes

  1. 1.

    I cite these long passages to highlight how observations recounted in written narratives codify events in particular ways.

  2. 2.

    During excavations, pollen samples were collected from each grave pit. Future analysis of these samples may reveal dense concentrations of corn pollen that could be used to map the use of corn in graves.

  3. 3.

    It is not known if Kivas D-2 or D-3 had similar floor cists since these structures were only partly excavated.

  4. 4.

    12-K-15-IV G, and 12-K-12-IV E

  5. 5.

    12-G-ST7-2-10

  6. 6.

    12-G-D8-4-3-3

  7. 7.

    12-G-ST7-3-2

  8. 8.

    12-11-8-2-1

  9. 9.

    12-G-2-4-34

  10. 10.

    12-19-1-V-1

  11. 11.

    An isolated quadrate bone of a third macaw was found in Plaza C (Lang and Harris, 1984 :115).

  12. 12.

    12-19-1-V-2

  13. 13.

    12-G-D4-4-1

  14. 14.

    12-19-1-V-1

  15. 15.

    12-G-2-4-14

  16. 16.

    12-20-6-5-1, possibly a female

  17. 17.

    12-16-36-5-2 and 12-16-36-4-1

  18. 18.

    12-16-36-5-2

  19. 19.

    12-16-36-4-1

  20. 20.

    Burials 12-16-29-2-9 and 12-16-29-5-2 were initially thought to be interred in Room 12-16-29. However, when the excavation was extended into Plaza C, it was clear these two women were interred in Plaza C. Subsequent room construction of the northern wall of Room 12-16-27 slightly intruded over the grave pit of 12-16-29-2-9.

  21. 21.

    12-16-29-5-1

  22. 22.

    12-16-29-2-9

  23. 23.

    12-18-6-3S-15

  24. 24.

    12-18-6-3S-8

  25. 25.

    12-18-6-3S-2

  26. 26.

    12-18-8-4S-8

  27. 27.

    12-18-8-4N-9

  28. 28.

    12-18-8-VI-I

  29. 29.

    12-18-8-VII-1

  30. 30.

    12-16-29-2-9

  31. 31.

    12-16-36-4-1

  32. 32.

    12-16-29-5-1

  33. 33.

    12-16-36-4-1

  34. 34.

    12-16-29-2-9

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    Ann M. Palkovich

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Palkovich, A.M. (2024). Breath, Animacy, and Death. In: Bodies, Ontology, and Bioarchaeology. Bioarchaeology and Social Theory. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-56023-1_9

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