Bones, Pots and Kula Valuables: Secondary Burials and Relational Personhood in the Southern Massim, Papua New Guinea

Simon Coxe

Australian National University, Australia; simon.coxe@anu.edu.au

Secondary burial practices in Papua New Guinea are well documented ethnographically, yet they have rarely been investigated by archaeologists. Secondary burials and the objects they were interred with can be understood as material expressions of relational personhood. This paper presents the recent findings from nine burial sites located on the islands of Panaeati and Pana Vara Vara in the Massim region. The analysis of over 1200 skeletal elements, representing 166 individuals, dated to between 650 and 100 cal. BP, represents the first systematic archaeological dataset for mortuary practices in the region. Skeletal remains were deliberately fragmented, selected, commingled, and often placed in pots as burial receptacles. Culturally significant items, including kula trade valuables, were also documented. Drawing on oral traditions and ethnographic accounts of relational personhood, these assemblages are interpreted as material expressions of partible personhood: the practice of bodily fragmentation and the use of inalienable objects to sustain kinship networks and exchange obligations across generations and island communities. The findings offer a contextual model for the archaeology of Melanesian secondary burial practices, with broader implications for how bodily fragmentation and associations with material culture are interpreted in mortuary contexts globally.