Arguments for an Alternative Approach to the Interpretation of the Human Remains from the Cucuteni Culture
Arguments for an Alternative Approach to the Interpretation of the Human Remains from the Cucuteni Culture

Summary/Abstract: This paper will briefly present the current findings regarding the human remains from the Cucuteni culture. We will critically examine the contexts of discovery and their current interpretations: deposition of the entire body - burial; deposition of body parts - ritual deposition; scattered bones/bone fragments - ritual anthropophagy or just indifference.We will then present the theoretical basis, which could allow for an alternative interpretation. When tackling the difficult problem of understanding the attitude towards death of the Cucuteni population, the major problem that the archaeologist faces is self-decontextualization. Paradoxically enough, such an attempt to strip down ones intellectual mindset requires plenty of “intellectual prosthetics”. After placing the Cucuteni funerary finds into a wider contemporary context, we will try to offer an alternative theoretical path to the understanding of the rituals accompanying the moment of death, enrolling the help of concepts borrowed from philosophy, analytical psychology, socio-biology and anthropology.

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