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Document Details : Title: 'Tussen wieg en graf' Subtitle: De materiële baby- en kindergrafcultuur in de eerste helft van het tweede millennium v.Chr. in de Levant en de Mesopotamische tekstuele bronnen als middel tot reconstructie van het baby- en kinderleven Author(s): HUENAERTS, Jasmien Journal: Terra Incognita Volume: 1 Date: 2006 Pages: 113-126 DOI: 10.2143/TI.1.0.2015273 Abstract : ‘Between the cradle and the grave’: The material culture of infant and child graves in the first halve of the second millennium BC in the Levant and the Mesopotamian literary sources as a means of reconstruction of the infant and child life. During the first half of the second millennium B.C. infants and children were buried in jar burials at different places throughout the Levant. Older children usually got a different kind of grave. The criteria to bury an infant or a child in a particular way were however not clearly defined. At various sites including Tel Dan, Megiddo, Gezer, Hazor, Qatna, Tel el Ghassil, … infants and children’s graves were discovered which showed comparable features just as remarkable differences. A confrontation with a number of Mesopotamian texts such as lullabies, Lama_tu incantations and other magical texts offers interesting insights concerning the life of infants and children in the Ancient Near East. Anthropological research of African and Oceania tribes provides the research with a new scope. The existence of so called rites de passage in certain tribes yields intriguing comparisons with the Ancient Near East. |
