San Antonio College Library

"The Encyclopedia of Cremation is the first major reference resource focused on cremation. Spanning many world cultures it documents regional histories, ideological movements and leading individuals that fostered cremation whilst also presenting cremation as a universal practice. Tracing ancient and classical cremation sites, historical and contemporary cremation processes and procedures of both scientific and legal kind, the encyclopedia also includes...

This edited volume draws historians, anthropologists and archaeologists together to explore the contested worlds of epidemic corpses and their disposal. Why are burials so frequently at the center of disagreement, recrimination and protest during epidemics? Why are the human corpses produced in the course of infectious disease outbreaks seen as dangerous, not just to the living, but also to the continued existence of society and civilization? Examining...

Reid examines mummies from around the world, including South America, the Taklamakan desert in China, peat bogs in northern Europe and in the Canary Islands.

"Do Funerals Matter? is a creative interweaving of historical, sociocultural, and research-based perspectives on death rituals, drawing from myriad sources to create a picture of what death rituals have been; and where, especially in the Western world, they are going. The classic edition includes a new preface from the author reflecting on changes in the field since the book's initial publication. Death educators, researchers, counselors, clergy,...

"Across Africa, funerals and events remembering the dead have become larger and even more numerous over the years. Whereas in the West death is normally a private and family affair, in Africa funerals are often the central life cycle event, unparalleled in cost and importance, for which families harness vast amounts of resources to host lavish events for multitudes of people with ramifications well beyond the event. Though officials may try to regulate...

This study of the changing relationships between burial rituals and social structure in Early Iron Age Greece will be required reading for all archaeologists working with burial evidence, in whatever period. This book differs from many recent studies of state formation in that unique and particular developments are given as much weight as those factors which are common to all early states. The ancient literary evidence and more recent historical and...

Never before available in paperback, J.M.C. Toynbee's study is the most comprehensive book on Roman burial practices. Ranging throughout the Roman world - from Rome to Pompeii, from Britain to Jerusalem - Toynbee's book examines funeral practices from a wide variety of perspectives. Toynbee first examines Roman beliefs about death and the afterlife, revealing that few Romans believed in the Elysian Fields of poetic invention. She then describes the...

"Death in Black and White takes a behind-the-scenes look at contemporary funeral practices to discover what similarities and differences exist between African American and European American cultures' experience of dealing with death. The author charts the divergent origins of such rituals of mourning from pre-colonial Africa and Europe to the time in which these cultural traditions came into contact during the period of American slavery, and the degree...