Archaeology, Ethnology & Anthropology of Eurasia 47 (2) 2019   DOI: 10.17746/1563-0110.2019.47.2.040-047

Annotation:  Late Middle and Early Upper Paleolithic of the Eastern Adriatic and the Problem of the Regional Midd Insight into Ceramic Technologies at the Maikop Site of Ust-Dzheguta, Karachay-Cherkessia Chalcolithic and Bronze Age (4th to 3rd Millennia BC) Burials with Gold Ornaments in the Caucasian M Archaeozoological Studies at Konoplyanka, the Southern Trans-Urals Burials in Anthropomorphic Jars in the Philippines The Tamga Signs of the Turkic Nomads in the Altai and Semirechye: Comparisons and Identifi cations Belt Sets of the “Redikar Type” in Medieval Cemeteries of the Volga Finns An Assemblage from a Medieval Burial at Lake Parisento, Gydan Peninsula, the Arctic Zone of Western Finds of Medieval Coins from Eski-Yurt, Crimea Children’s Games in the Sociocultural Space of a Siberian Town: Historical and Archaeological Contex On the Methodology of Studying Palimpsests in Rock Art: The Case of the Shalabolino Rock Art Site, The Use of Remote Sensing, Geophysical Methods and Soil Analysis in the Study of Sites Disturbed by Miklouho-Maclay’s Legacy in Russian- and English-Language Academic Research, 1992–2017 Remnants of the Snake Cult Among the Khakas (Late 19th to Mid 20th Century) “Taiga” and “River” Components in the Nanai Socio-Tribal Organization at Lake Bolon, the Lower Amur The Armenian Epic Poem “Daredevils of Sassoun” and the Mahabharata: Similarity of the Ethnographic S Antemortem Cranial Injuries in the Altai Mountains Pastoralists of the Scythian and Xiongnu-Sarmatia   

Burials in Anthropomorphic Jars in the Philippines

A.V. Tabarev¹, A.E. Patrusheva², and N. Cuevas³

¹Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography, Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pr. Akademika Lavrentieva 17, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

²Novosibirsk State University, Pirogova 1, Novosibirsk, 630090, Russia

³National Museum of the Philippines, Padre Burgos Avenue, Rizal Park, Manila, 1000, Philippines

The first joint study by Russian and Philippine archaeologists addresses an unusual variant of a burial tradition distributed in Maritime Southeast Asia—burials in anthropomorphic clay jars, found in Ayub Cave (southern Mindanao Island, Philippines), excavated by specialists from the National Museum of the Philippines in 1991-1992, and tentatively dated to 500 BC to 500 AD. Of special interest are lids of jars shaped as painted human heads with individualized facial features and expressions. The finds suggest that Ayub Cave was a necropolis of the tribal elite, and that vessels were produced by a special group of potters using elaborate “prestige technologies”. The Ayub ceramic collection has various parallels relating to clay figurines and decoration, including painting, among Late Neolithic and Early Metal Age assemblages from the Philippines (Luzon, Palawan, and Negros Islands), Indonesia (Sumba, Flores, and Bali Islands), and other regions of the Pacific Basin from Japan (Jomon) and Korea (Early Iron Age burials) to the Vanuatu Islands (Lapita culture). These parallels suggest that the source of the anthropomorphic symbolism was the Austronesian migration, with one of its routes passing from southern China via Taiwan, the northern Philippines, Mariana Islands, and further south to Melanesia and Polynesia.

Keywords: Southeast Asia, Philippines, Ayub Cave, Early Metal Age, burials, anthropomorphic jars, ritual