Issues of theory and method in the analysis of Paleolithic mortuary behavior: A view from Shanidar Cave

Mortuary behavior (activities concerning dead conspecifics) is one of many traits that were previously widely considered to have been uniquely human, but on which perspectives have changed markedly in recent years. Theoretical approaches to hominin mortuary activity and its evolution have undergone major revision, and advances in diverse archeological and paleoanthropological methods have brought new ways of identifying behaviors such as intentional burial. Despite these advances, debates concerning the nature of hominin mortuary activity, particularly among the Neanderthals, rely heavily on the rereading of old excavations as new finds are relatively rare, limiting the extent to which such debates can benefit from advances in the field. The recent discovery of in situ articulated Neanderthal remains at Shanidar Cave offers a rare opportunity to take full advantage of these methodological and theoretical developments to understand Neanderthal mortuary activity, making a review of these advances relevant and timely.

tion in Paleolithic mortuary behavior, including intentional burial and cannibalism/body processing at other sites, 19,[29][30][31] which are relevant to characterizing Neanderthal capacities for cultural variation and innovation.
A major source of controversy has been how to identify funerary behavior in the archeological record and distinguish between scenarios leaving similar archeological signatures, for example, chance preservation of a complete body in a natural depression versus intentional F I G U R E 1 View of Shanidar Cave, seen from the south (photograph: Graeme Barker) [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com] burial. [17][18][19][20][32][33][34][35][36][37] Data obtained at the time of discovery are critical to confirming or disproving intentional human agency in the interment process, but the rarity of new in situ Neanderthal fossil finds has meant that most recent research has inevitably concentrated on "rereading" old excavations, primarily from western Europe, for which contextual and taphonomic information is limited. 32,[35][36][37][38] The recovery and recognition of "grave goods" during some of the early excavations of Middle Paleolithic hominin remains, for example, those of H. sapiens at Skhul 39 and Qafzeh, 40 attest to the quality of some earlier excavations, and implies their absence at other sites may be genuine. Equally, the paucity of recently excavated skeletal material has further limited the impact on the "Neanderthal burial debate" of recent advances in areas including cave geology and stratigraphy, sediment micromorphology and chemistry, biostratinomy and forensic taphonomy that offer the potential to evaluate the archeological and cultural contexts of hominin remains more robustly than was previously possible.
In this context, renewed excavations at Shanidar Cave by some of the present authors 41 A reconsideration of current theoretical, methodological, and practical approaches to debates on the evolution of hominin mortuary behavior is therefore extremely timely, and this review aims to achieve this with a focus on shaping future investigations at Shanidar Cave and other similar key sites. We begin by taking a broad perspective, considering the relevance of evidence for mortuary activity within the wider animal kingdom in shaping hypotheses and expectations for such behavior among extinct hominins, and then focusing more specifically on the investigation of mortuary behavior among past hominin taxa. In doing so, we use the emerging Shanidar Cave data to highlight the potential for investigating the evolution of mortuary activities, taking full advantage of recent advances in modern archeological science and broader theoretical perspectives.

| MORTUARY BEHAVIOR IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM: A COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE
Identifying an appropriate null hypothesis for Neanderthal (or other hominin) mortuary behavior is an important baseline for attempting to identify and evaluate archeological evidence. Given other behavioral similarities between our taxon and Neanderthals, should the null hypothesis be that Neanderthals did not engage in mortuary activity, or should we work from the assumption that they did? Indeed, should we assume that the earliest representatives of H. sapiens behaved exactly as recent modern humans do? There are indications that some of the earliest potential evidence of mortuary behavior in the Middle Paleolithic follow geographic, rather than taxon-specific patterns, 22 so investigating the contexts of other Middle and Upper Paleolithic hominin remains with the same scrutiny and threshold of evidential support for interpretation is essential if we are to understand the origins of the kinds of mortuary behavior we see in recent populations of our own taxon.
The long anthropological tradition of looking to our primate relatives, or even to more distantly related species, offers an important point of departure for understanding the nature and context of mortuary activity among hominins, but one that is not always given adequate recognition. Examples of mortuary behavior (as defined above) have been documented across a wide range of species 20,45-50 (Table 1), from the carrying of dead infants for several weeks by chimpanzee mothers, to the revisiting of elephant carcasses by members of their social group, 47 to "necrophoresis" (removal of corpses from living areas) and "necroclaustralization" (corpse-covering) behavior among termites. 48 What is common to most of these mortuary practices is that they occur among species where there are long-term bonds among group members, and a relatively high level of social cognition. Thus, several of the mortuary activities commonly identified as significant or unique among humans are not necessarily as unusual as we might think, yet have not been considered by archeologists for whom burial is considered to be "symbolic" by default. 20,46 Spatial and temporal variation in mortuary activity within the hominin lineage, including that potentially apparent among our hominin relatives such as Homo naledi, 51 [63][64][65] Evidence suggests the bodies of conspecifics were sometimes processed for consumption and that this may have reflected ecological stress. 66,67 There is less evidence for the use of hominin bone to make tools, 30 or for nondietary related F I G U R E 2 (a) Views of the Neanderthal articulated skeletal remains excavated in 2015, identified as part of Solecki's Shanidar 5, looking east; before (left) and after (right) the tibia was lifted. Note the burrow, probably of a mole rat, just above the bones; (b) the crushed skull of an adult Neanderthal excavated in 2018 adjacent to the location of Solecki's Shanidar 4 (the "flower burial"). Scales: (a) 8 cm; (b) 3 cm (photographs: Graeme Barker) [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com] processing of remains. 22 However, at present, it is only among modern humans that we have evidence for ritual significance attributed to hominin bone tools. 64 While variation in mortuary activity in both taxa may not be entirely due to cultural variation, the important observation is that while a single baseline expectation, or null hypothesis, for Neanderthal mortuary activity cannot be easily formulated, there is no reason not to expect a level of mortuary-related activity among Neanderthals, or conversely that mortuary behavior in the earliest H. sapiens was expressed in the same way as in more recent populations of our taxon. Whatever the case, one cannot simply conclude from the evidence we have that "Neanderthals buried their dead." It may be more profitable to ask why some Neanderthals buried some of their dead, some of the time.
So how can this problem be resolved, and what should we take from this comparative perspective? Ultimately, the combination and weight of multiple lines of evidence for intentionality and deliberate action appear to be essential, 22 incorporating many of the components discussed below. What is also clear from ethnographic studies of humans and behavioral studies of other animals is that we must keep our minds open to alternative scenarios (e.g., covering the body with earth, or stones, or plant materials, or textiles, or a combination of materials), to whether/how these can be tested archeologically, and the impact of alternative scenarios on skeletal presentation and other aspects of the archeological evidence. We also need to take care to avoid conflating the question of a taxon's capacity for a behavior with whether or not they undertook that behavior. While some researchers have debated whether Neanderthals practiced certain mortuary behaviors, for example, interment, very few have argued that they lacked the capacity for such behaviors.
Of the many challenges encountered during discussions about mortuary behavior that of terminology is frequent but lacks an obvious resolution. 68 Terms like "burial," "pit," and "grave" perhaps misleadingly evoke images of a deep, straight-sided shaft, which in terms of Neanderthal burials, are far from being the case; even assuming a degree of sediment deflation, existing examples are relatively shallow and the term "scoop" may describe reality better. Cases like these can be interpreted in multiple ways and contribute to confusion or generate disagreement where none may in fact exist. However, no single set of terminology would appear to satisfy all researchers: proposed terms such as "deposition" as a neutral description for a find of archeological human remains 20,68 for some people still carry implicit assumptions (deposition implies action for which someone or something is responsible), while "burial" may sometimes imply intentionality. Although no simple solution is apparent, qualifying adjectives ("intentional burial," "anthropogenic pit," "natural gully") help to reduce ambiguity and misunderstanding. "Mortuary activity" or "mortuary behavior" offer useful general terms for activities by conspecifics concerning or around the dead body, like cannibalism, contrasting with "funerary activity" or "funerary behavior," which imply formal practices or rituals associated with and symbolizing the relationship of the dead to the living.    One of the issues to be considered in deciphering the stratigraphic and sedimentary context of human remains is that the starting point It is likely that available natural locations, for example, karstic cavities and gullies, will have been exploited by Neanderthals as locations for the disposal of their dead. 19,22 In this scenario, bodies may have been intentionally covered, partially or completely, with sediment or are all common (e.g., [92][93][94][95] ). Most of these are identifiable macroscopically, but far more may be evident through microscopic examination of sediment sample thin sections. Some may overlap with the processes operating in the infilling of graves, but the purposeful infilling of a cavity such as a grave can sometimes lead to characteristic stratification and fabric (e.g., Reference 89; Figure 6).
Postdepositional processes may provide evidence for the state of the body when it came to rest. Sediments that accumulated or were placed over and against the body may be displaced during putrefactive swelling, and then collapse into voids left by decay of soft tissues. 86 The presence of large quantities of decaying organic matter and leaking body fluids can lead to localized calcification 89    Paleolithic sites in France. 11,115 In the case of Shanidar Cave, it remains striking that most of the bodies or body parts seem to have been cached or placed in close proximity to each other in the center of the cave, in natural cavities and shelters afforded by massive boulders derived from the major fault that dissects the cave's ceiling above the Solecki trench. Whilst it could be argued that this clustering is a product of excavation bias, it is also the case that the "rockfall landscape" at the center of the cave provided natural niches that were utilized repeatedly for the disposal/treatment of dead individuals.

| ECOLOGY AND AFFORDANCES
There are ethnographic examples of "deathscapes" or "necroscapes" in which certain locations are seen as appropriate for funerary use either by association with another burial or because the landform has special meaning. 42,116 It is clearly risky to transfer concepts like these to the Paleolithic, and indeed to a different hominin taxa, but the unique assemblage of the 10 known individuals in Shanidar Cave, and especially the Shanidar 4 "cluster" or "stack," does invite such transference, particularly given that the systematic

| CONCLUSIONS
Four key conclusions emerge from the above discussion. First, the Neanderthals should not be thought of as a monolithic entity: they had a geographical range that extended from Spain to Siberia and from Wales to the southern parts of western Asia and were around as a lineage for over 300,000 years, during which time they adapted to glacial and interglacial conditions and are known to have evolved physically and interbred with other taxa. [6][7][8] They also evolved culturally, and indeed there are significant differences between stone tool assemblages made early and those made toward the end of their chronological range, as well as evidence for rapid changes in lithic technology in response to climate fluctuations, for instance in some French cave sequences. 102,118 There are also spatial variations in lithic assemblages. Across this immense span of time and space it is inconceivable that adaptations and behaviors were identical. It is extremely unlikely that mortuary behaviors, as a subset of cultural activity, were uniform in time and space.
Second, it is clear that mortuary behavior has a deep history in hominins and other organisms. It should therefore not be surprising that at times there are indications that Neanderthals are associated with activities relating to the dead that might be termed funerary. The archeological record indicates that this behavior was highly variable and includes cannibalism, the use of human bone for toolmaking, and inhumations.
Third, it is misguided to look for "modern human behavior" in Neanderthals, or indeed in earlier representatives of our own taxon.
The use of rigid criteria based on more recent modern human analogies to identify burial or other mortuary activity is likely unhelpful, 22,70 as it fails to allow for potential differences in the ways in which hominins expressed mortuary behavior. We should definitely not be forcing any expectations of a "progressive" typology ranging from mortuary to funerary behavior on to what they did. It is better to examine what Neanderthals and other hominins did, where and when, with the utmost rigor and with as few preconceptions as possible, and to try to identify what factors stimulated particular behaviors.
Finally, it is possible, and indeed likely, that many apparent differences between the archeology of Neanderthals and that of more recent H. sapiens may be taphonomic in nature rather than reflecting contrasting behaviors. We are removed from them by the immense geomorphic disruption of the Last Glacial Maximum and by the loss through decay of all but the most durable physical components of their equipment and culture. The surprise is that anything should survive of their intimate lives and deaths and the challenge is to recover as much from the archeological record as we can.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This study derives from a workshop funded by the Wenner-Gren