Resumen

L'HEUREUX, G. LORENA  y  AMOROSI, TOMAS. THE BURIAL OF CERRO SOTA SITE (MAGALLANES, CHILE) OVER SEVENTY YEARS AFTER ITS EXCAVATION. Magallania [online]. 2010, vol.38, n.2, pp. 133-149. ISSN 0718-2244.  http://dx.doi.org/10.4067/S0718-22442010000200009.

This work presents the results of the detailed analysis of the bone material that make up the multiple burial in Cerro Sota Cave (Pali Aike Volcano Field, Chile), excavated by the American archaeologist Junius Bird in 1936. Pre and postdepositional taphonomic changes are analysed together with the pathologic and physiological processes that affected the nine individuals identified at the site (six were part of the burial while three were found outside the structure). This material are currently housed at the Anthropology Division of the American Museum of Natural History of New york. An analysis of anthropic variables shows that the evidence of intentional thermal alteration of the skeletons are not enough to define this burial as cremation, and that the traces of fire action are more appropriately interpreted as partial combustion of the burial. The scenario that involves the death of seven individuals (six from the burial site here analyzed and one that is lost) at the beginning of the late Holocene in southern Pali Aike (ca. 3.600 años BP.) could be related with increased mortality due to the greater population density inferred for the area after 4.000 BP., although the precise causes of the simultaneous deaths are still unknown.

Palabras llave : multiple burial; late Holocene beginning; partial combustion.