Sacrifice & Value: Seeking an anthropological archaeology of sacrifice

Report from session #172 of the 27th EAA Annual Meeting, 8th September 2021

Marianne Moen (Postdoctoral researcher, Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Human Sacrifice and Value project) and Matthew J. Walsh (Senior Researcher, National Museum of Denmark, researcher Human Sacrifice and Value project)

The EAA’s 2021 GM included a session entitled ‘Sacrifice and Value: Seeking an anthropological archaeology of sacrifice’, chaired by project members from the Human Sacrifice and Value project (funded by the Norwegian Research Council, project no. 275947). See Figure 1. The session provided a platform for discussing various expressions of sacrifice (be they objects, animals or humans) across different temporal and geographical settings. With a special focus on the values that may have been at play in sacrificial acts as well as the logic of sacrifice, the session also involved discussions of personhood, identity and value.

Figure 1 Opening slide of the session ‘Sacrifice and Value: Seeking an anthropological archaeology of sacrifice.

Figure 1 Opening slide of the session ‘Sacrifice and Value: Seeking an anthropological archaeology of sacrifice.

The eight papers discussed brought diverse views and approaches to a vast subject matter. The depth and breadth of these papers mirror the wide material and theoretical diaspora within the study of sacrifice (and human sacrifice in particular). As session organizers, Moen and Walsh are grateful to all the contributors for their interesting and enlightening contributions. The discussion which followed the presentations further highlighted how much common ground was shared between a diverse cast of contributions.

Walsh opened the session with his paper “From Obligation and Oblation to Sublimated Violence: Transformations of human sacrifice in the prehistory of northernmost Europe.” Providing a theoretical platform for the session and presenting work completed over the duration of the Human Sacrifice and Value project, Walsh presented an overview of key potential sacrificial executions from prehistoric Europe with a focus on wetland depositions. Next, he compared those cases contextually over time via network analysis, in order to determine whether the sacrifice dataset he assembled exhibited temporal trends. See Figure 2. The paper set the scene for the variety of approaches and materials to follow, and further underscored the multiple motivations and expressions observable in archaeological evidence for sacrifice.

Figure 2 Slide from Walsh’s presentation showing a NeighborNet network modelling changes over time in cases of sacrificial violence and deposition in wetlands in Northern Europe.

Figure 2 Slide from Walsh’s presentation showing a NeighborNet network modelling changes over time in cases of sacrificial violence and deposition in wetlands in Northern Europe.

Next, Moen presented a conceptual discussion of personhood and value in “Body Parts in the Bog: perceptions of personhood, value and sacrifice”. By seeking to untangle the meaning behind depositions of partial bodies, Moen offered a view of perceived personhood as something which may potentially have been contained in different vessels. In this way, the deposition of partial human remains can justifiably be interpreted alongside complete bodies in wetland depositions. She closed by arguing that the deconstructed meaning of human sacrifice necessitates that all human beings be considered persons in order to be meaningful. From this, Moen then suggested qualifying the terminology somewhat: universal personhood on the basis of having a human body may arguably not always be applicable to past cultures.

McGinnis’s paper “Bands between the living and the dead: Thor’s hammer rings in relational and reciprocal perspective” set out to query the use of Thor’s hammer rings (a category of finds associated with the Scandinavian Late Iron Age) as transitional aids. By examining the objects with regard to what they could reveal of relationships between different people rather than by studying them as a means of communicating individual identity, McGinnis laid out a case for different ways of viewing the logic of sacralised exchange that underpinned the religious world—and the lived experience—of the period.

Next, the session moved away from Northern Europe and focused on the Peloponnese with Dimopoulou’s enquiry into “Rituals and Sacrifices in Ancient Arcadian Cults”. See Figure 3. In her paper, Dimopoulou sought to understand rituals and sacrifices as integral parts of Arcadian material culture. By placing them in context with beliefs and thoughts connected to specific regulations, cults or aspects of social prestige, this paper re-examined the significance of sacrifice, concluding that it was embedded in multiple strands of past reality as well as the material remains thereof.

Figure 3 Presenter Sotiria Dimopoulou (University of Münster, PhD cand. of Classical Archaeology) explains decorations that show ritual activity on a cult garment of Despoina of Lycosura.

Figure 3 Presenter Sotiria Dimopoulou (University of Münster, PhD cand. of Classical Archaeology) explains decorations that show ritual activity on a cult garment of Despoina of Lycosura.

Hohle engaged with René Girard’s theory of an innate desire for violence as a driver for sacrifice with her paper on “Mimetic Rituals and the Social”. Here, she examined Neolithic mimetic practices along with other frameworks which seek to understand sacrifice as a mechanism to avoid violence outside of fixed and acceptable borders. Acknowledging critique against Girard’s theory, Hohle proposed activating concepts of imitation and representation in order to understand prehistoric sacrificial practices.

By contrast, Gralak drew on Bronze and Iron Age material from Central and Northern Europe in his paper “The Question of Potlatch in Archaeology”. In order to query the relationship between sacrifice and conspicuous consumption, Gralak posed questions about the connections between altruism and visibility, and how spending and visible consumption may have a vital social function. Anchored in Bronze Age hoard depositions in particular, Gralak examined such practices as a way of establishing and maintaining connections between people and the divine.

Waldhart and Schmölzer’s “Fibulae Left Behind: sacrifices at first sight? A preliminary report of the sacrificial site at Oberleibnig (Tirol/Austria)” presented an Iron Age sacrificial site in Austria. Study of this important site simultaneously allows for examinations of the processes of Romanization as well as social phenomena such as sacrifice. By focusing on the fibulae deposited via queries of object agency and their place in the wider context of the site and assemblages, the paper touched on deeper currents within the mechanisms of sacrifice and the relative values of what is offered. The potential layers of meaning embedded in acts and objects of sacrifice were thus approached.

In the session’s final paper, Maczek presented on “Early Medieval Weapon Depositions in Watery Contexts: Continental European Perspectives”. By placing the deposition of weapons in lakes and rivers in the Early Medieval period in context with the concurrent decline of weapon burials, Maczek enquired whether or not the traditional interpretation of such deposits as the remains of conflict has overlooked other causes, such as offerings which may instead relate to boundary markings or social communication.

Overall, the session combined a varied set of materials and approaches with empirical material from a range of areas and chronological periods. Though the session organizers have not been able to publish a collected volume of the papers, it is to be hoped that the individual contributors will seek to publish of their own accord, thereby furthering archaeological debate on matters of sacrifice, and bringing the valuable discussions from this session to a wider readership. We would like to thank all of the presenters and everyone in attendance.

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