The Palaeolithic Origins of Human Burial

Humans are unique in that they expend considerable effort and ingenuity in disposing of the dead. Some of the recognisable ways we do this are visible in the Palaeolithic archaeology of the Ice Age. The Palaeolithic Origins of Human Burial takes a novel approach to the long-term development of human mortuary activity - the various ways we deal with the dead and with dead bodies. It is the first comprehensive survey of Palaeolithic mortuary activity in the English language.

Paul Pettitt is Senior Lecturer in Palaeolithic Archaeology at the University of Sheffield, UK. He has degrees from the universities of Birmingham, London and Cambridge, and was Senior Archaeologist in the Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit at the University of Oxford and Research Fellow and Tutor in Archaeology and Anthropology at Keble College, Oxford. His research interests focus on the European Middle and Upper Palaeolithic. He has published over 190 papers in scientific journals and edited volumes, including chapters on the Neanderthals (in the Oxford Handbook of Archaeology) and the rise of modern humans (in Scarre (ed.) The Human Past). In 2003 he co-discovered Britain's first examples of Palaeolithic cave art at Creswell Crags, where he currently excavates.