'The Vampire Problem'

Photo from excavation website: http://ow.ly/wHrHT 

I have been telling myself I am going to resurrect my blog (and post regularly) for some time now and continually finding reasons why I am too busy to write something today, or this week or… you get the picture. Yesterday’s headlines finally inspired me to get back in action! “'Vampire' Skeleton Unearthed in Poland”. I mean, who doesn’t love a good vampire story?? The article intrigued me because I am very interested in ‘deviant burials’ or individuals who are treated ‘counter to’ or ‘outside of’ ‘normal’ (predominant) burial traditions of the time/culture/area/population. Enough air quotes for ya?

My excessive use of air quotes exemplifies what I like to think of as ‘The Vampire Problem’ or the difficulties surrounding reconstructing cultural ideologies from physical remains. Unfortunately, it is incredibly hard to say for sure whether or not a particular burial is ‘deviant’ because you need a good deal of evidence to create a clear picture of ‘the norm’ before you can determine what is outside that norm. A key tenant in human behaviour and culture is variation. So how do you determine what is normal variation and what isn’t? You gather a lot of data. So next time you're reading a news story on archaeological discovery pay attention to sample size. Is your sample 3 individuals or 300? 

Once you have established a baseline of what would be considered normal for a certain time/culture/area/population (or even sub-population) it becomes even more difficult! Many burial rituals associated with deviancy apply to more than one category of ‘deviant’. For example decapitation can signify criminals, execution victims (criminal or not), Vampires, etc. (read more on cool skeletal trauma here). How do you determine what category of deviancy your sample reflects? Context is key. Think about the historical sources of evidence available (or presented in the article) and think about the additional sources of archaeological evidence such as location, relationship to other burials, and orientation of the burial which provide clues to burial context.

Hopefully I have not discouraged you too much yet! While difficult, re-constructing cultural ideologies (or solving the Vampire Problem) is not impossible. Through meticulous research not only of the bodies themselves but also of the historical evidence around cultural practices and beliefs, one can make a case for a burial in a certain manner signifying a certain thing (ie. Decapitated criminal, vampire, etc.). Like any scientist, we gather evidence and then create a hypothesis to explain that evidence. So next time you click on that Vampire headline make sure you put on your critical scientist hat (or perhaps your deerstalker) and really think about the evidence presented and the conclusions reached.