The "gay caveman" buried with "household jugs."
(Photo from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1374060/Gay-caveman-5-000-year-old-male-skeleton-outed-way-buried.html)
I don't even know how to begin. First off, I love how majority the newspaper articles are stating that this "gay” “caveman" is not even a "caveman” as this individual is dated from about 2,900 and 2,500 B.C., and was from a Copper Age farming community... not even close to being a caveman! I also I find it very interesting that reporters were soon to jump to the conclusion that because "he" (who may not even be a he because there is a sliding scale on sexing a skeleton, as we discussed in class) was buried facing the way of a female and was buried with female grave goods, “he” is considered automatically gay. Though, in one article I read, it stated that people from that period took funerary rights very seriously, therefore it would have been unlikely that this individual would have been buried incorrectly.
One way to look at this type of information would be that the dead do not bury themselves, and we did talk abut this in class as well. Who knows what this individuals family thought of them, their life style, and this individuals sexuality. Another point is that it may not have been the family who preformed the burial. There is also a chance that this individual could have been transgendered. Now, I'm just going off on one of my own ideas, but maybe there was a chance that this individual could have been reburied? Maybe this individual was dug up after an initial burial and then reburied in a different manner. Who knows. It is very interesting how much attention this archaeological find has gotten and how much it has gotten out of hand.
Another point that I find interesting that I saw in Krystal Grove's blog (http://archofdeath.blogspot.ca) was that the idea of sexual orientation in western culture could have been very different in other cultures and it could have been different for this specific individual as well. Maybe the culture was diverse, or this individual had to take on different roles in their family.
Bottom line is, I feel like the press went a little crazy when naming the "gay caveman” because who really knows.
You can find more information at these websites:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1374060/Gay-caveman-5-000-year-old-male-skeleton-outed-way-buried.html
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