A cremation pyre dating back about 9,500 years has been discovered in the city. Africaoffering a fresh perspective on the complexity of ancient hunter-gatherer societies.
Researchers say the fire, discovered in a rock shelter at the foot of Mount Gora in the north Malawibelieved to be the world's oldest bonfire containing adult human remains, the oldest confirmed intentional cremation in Africa, and the first bonfire associated with African hunter-gatherers.
In total, excavations in 2017 and 2018 in two groups uncovered 170 individual human bone fragments – apparently belonging to an adult woman just under 1.5 meters (5 feet) tall – with layers of ash, charcoal and sediment.
However, the woman's skull was missing, and cut marks suggest that some of the bones had been separated at the joints and the flesh had been removed before the body was burned.
“There is no evidence that they committed any violence or cannibalism towards the remains,” said Dr. Jessica Cerezo-Roman of the University of Oklahoma, who led the study. Instead, she said, the body parts may have been removed as part of a burial ritual, perhaps to be worn as tokens.
Dr. Jessica Thompson, senior author of the study from Yale University, said that while the practice may seem inappropriate, people still keep strands of hair or ashes of relatives to scatter them in a meaningful place.
The researchers said the rock shelter appears to have been used as a natural monument and the burials occurred approximately 16,000 to 8,000 years ago. In addition to complete skeletons, very small collections of bones from various individuals have been found.
“[This] supports our hypothesis that some of the missing bones from the cremated woman may have been deliberately removed and taken as tokens for storage or reburial elsewhere,” said Dr. Ebeth Sawchuk, study co-author from the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.
The team also found flakes and stone points in the fire, which may have been added as part of a burial ritual.
“Did people actively throw these things into the fire or… were they in the body itself?” – said Thompson. Cerezo-Roman said one theory is that people were banging rocks to cut the woman's flesh.
The team also found that the pyre was the size of a king-size mattress and would have required considerable knowledge, skill and coordination to construct and maintain, while two clusters of bones indicate the body was moved during cremation.
While it is unclear why the woman was given such special treatment, the team found that at least one fire was subsequently lit directly above the site of the fire – perhaps as a sign of remembrance.
However, there is also evidence of numerous fires at the site, and Thompson notes that it was likely that the shelter was also used for daily life.
Sign up for Science Advances journalThe team notes that the oldest known bonfire containing human remains was previously found in Alaska and dates back to approximately 11,500 years ago, however it was a small child.
Indeed, most incinerated human remains 8,000 years old or older have not been found in pyres, and prior to the latest discovery, the earliest confirmed intentional cremations in Africa only appeared around 3,500 years ago, among Neolithic pastoral people.
Thompson said the discovery that different people deserved different treatment after death “suggests that in life their social roles would also have been much more complex than I ever imagined, or that is certainly stereotypically described for tropical hunter-gatherers, especially those that old.”
Joel Irish, professor of anthropology and archeology at Liverpool John Moores University, who was not involved in the work, welcomed the discovery.
“The fact that this is such an early date and that they were transient as hunter-gatherers makes it even more surprising,” he said.
“At such an early stage, they clearly had developed belief systems and a high level of social complexity.”
