The Lady under the hill: an osteobiography of a Middle Bronze Age cremated female from Ermelose Heide (Ermelo, prov. Gelderland, the Netherlands)

Abstract

Cremated human remains are an important source of information on the life and well-being of past individuals, but due to their nature (i.e. burnt, fragmented) often form a challenge to analyse. Generally, cremation cemeteries are considered on a population level, but by creating life narratives, the sociocultural

roles that certain individuals had in past societies can be reconstructed. The burial ground of Ermelose Heide currently consists of 46 prehistoric mounds. Several mounds were excavated in the 1950s, whereby mound 14 was comprised of two "submounds", a small and a large one, after which both mounds were covered to look like one. Mound 14 contained 7 cremation graves, 4 in 14Large and 3 in 14Small. One of the cremation deposits, V41, was located separately from the rest in 14Small and was composed of the burnt remains of an older female and a foetus (~28 weeks in utero). The remains of the female were nearly complete, as opposed to the other cremation deposits in mound 14. Although it is not possible to prove that the female was the mother of the foetus, if indeed she was, she would have been visibly pregnant.

In addition, her lumbar vertebrae showed lesions that could be the result of trauma, which most likely was exacerbated by the presence of an incomplete fusion of her 4th lumbar vertebra. Considering that she may have been visibly pregnant and potentially had trouble or pain while walking as a result from the spinal trauma, it is possible that she was viewed upon differently than the rest. By creating an osteobiography

for the female with the foetus in mound 14, her life narrative highlights the divergent nature of her funerary practices, aiding in the reconstruction of her sociocultural role withing the MBA-society of Ermelose Heide.