Archaeologica.org

Hundreds of prehistoric dogs found buried throughout the southwestern United States show that canines played a key role in the spiritual beliefs of ancient Americans, new research suggests.

Throughout the region, dogs have been found buried with jewelry, alongside adults and children, carefully stacked in groups, or in positions that relate to important structures, said Dody Fugate, an assistant curator at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Beagle wrote:http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news ... rials.html

Hundreds of prehistoric dogs found buried throughout the southwestern United States show that canines played a key role in the spiritual beliefs of ancient Americans, new research suggests.

Throughout the region, dogs have been found buried with jewelry, alongside adults and children, carefully stacked in groups, or in positions that relate to important structures, said Dody Fugate, an assistant curator at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

When people came to the Americas, they brought their dogs with them. This article looks at the ritual burial of dogs and gives us an idea of how highly regarded they were.

Beagle wrote:When people came to the Americas, they brought their dogs with them.

kbs2244 wrote:Do se have any dates on these "prehistoric" burials?

kbs2244 wrote:Haven’t there been found elaborate dog burial grounds in both the Ashkelon area of the East Mediterranean and the Tunisia area of the Western Mediterranean?
Do se have any dates on these "prehistoric" burials?

Basically [ritual dog burial] is a pattern that's found around the world, and [Fugate]'s doing some really important work in documenting in detail the instances of that phenomena in her part of the world," Crockford said.

The Cooperton mammoth site contains the remnants of a young male Columbian mammoth which died sometime from 17,000 to 21,000 years ago. This site was excavated by the Museum of Great Plains at Lawton in 1961. Intriguingly, while excavating the mammoth, three hand-sized stones and a 15 pound boulder were uncovered near the skeleton.. Additionally, some of the bones bear break marks that occurred while the bones were still relatively fresh.

The investigators concluded that the mammoth had died from natural causes and had been discovered by a small band of hunters. They believe the three stones (which are much larger than other cobbles found in the area) were used to crush the bones on the boulder (which appears to have been brought into the site) to extract marrow from them.

The stones themselves do not show clear evidence of human manufacture and so the conclusions of the investigators may never be proved or disproved. The oldest accepted human habitation site in the Americas is the Monte Verde site in Chile which is generally accepted at an age of 12,500 years ago.