Asset Details
Do you wish to reserve the book?
These boots are made for burnin': Inferring the position of the corpse and the presence of leather footwears during cremation through isotope
Hey, we have placed the reservation for you!
By the way, why not check out events that you can attend while you pick your title.
Oops! Something went wrong.
Looks like we were not able to place the reservation. Kindly try again later.
Are you sure you want to remove the book from the shelf?
These boots are made for burnin': Inferring the position of the corpse and the presence of leather footwears during cremation through isotope
Do you wish to request the book?
These boots are made for burnin': Inferring the position of the corpse and the presence of leather footwears during cremation through isotope
Please be aware that the book you have requested cannot be checked out. If you would like to checkout this book, you can reserve another copy
We have requested the book for you!
Your request is successful and it will be processed during the Library working hours. Please check the status of your request in My Requests.
Oops! Something went wrong.
Looks like we were not able to place your request. Kindly try again later.
Journal Article
These boots are made for burnin': Inferring the position of the corpse and the presence of leather footwears during cremation through isotope
2021
Overview
Cremation is a complex mortuary practice, involving a number of activities of the living towards the dead before, during, and after the destruction of the bodily soft tissues by fire. The limiting information concerning these behavioral patterns obtained from the pyre remains and/or cremation deposits prevents the reconstruction of the handling of the corpse during the burning process. This pioneering study tries to determine the initial positioning of the corpse in the pyre and assess whether the deceased was wearing closed leather shoes during cremation through isotopic ([delta].sup.13 C, [delta].sup.18 O) and infrared (ATR-FTIR) analyses of experimentally burnt pig remains, used as a proxy for humans. The results obtained show that both the position of feet on or within the pyre and the presence of footwears may moderately-to-highly influence the oxygen isotope ratios of bone apatite carbonates and the cyanamide content of calcined bone in certain situations. By forming a protective layer, shoes appear to temporarily delay the burning of the underlying pig tissues and to increase the heat-shielding effect of the soft tissues protecting the bone mineral fraction. In such case, bioapatite bone carbonates exchange oxygen with a relatively more .sup.18 O-depleted atmosphere (due to the influence of lignin-derived oxygen rather than cellulose-derived oxygen), resulting in more pronounced decrease in the [delta].sup.18 O.sub.carb values during burning of the shoed feet vs. unshoed feet. The shift observed here was as high as 2.5%. A concomitant isotopic effect of the initial location of the feet in the pyres was also observed, resulting in a top-to-bottom decrease difference in the [delta].sup.18 O.sub.carb values of shoed feet of about 1.4% between each deposition level tested. Finally, the presence of cyanamide (CN/P [greater than or equal to] 0.02) seems to be indicative of closed footwear since the latter creates favorable conditions for its incorporation into bone apatite.
Publisher
Public Library of Science
Subject
