BurialsKerma
The Kerma culture (2500-1500 BC) once flourished in Sudan in the city of Kerma (modern-day the city of Kareema). The Kerma culture developed a centralized society composed of social classes and of royal family, priests, and commoners. Although the site at Kerma has not been well excavated yet, few American and European excavations in collaboration with archeologists from the Khartoum University came up with good information about the culture. These excavations revealed an elaborate cemetery, a royal city, temples, royal palaces, and an audience hall. In a 1993-1994 campaign Charles Bonnet uncovered the main town of Kerma with a fortification wall 10 meters in height and 1300 meters long 1.
The people of Kerma people buried their dead in simple niche cut pits. A tumulus or a mound superstructure of sand and gravel sometimes reaching 90 meters in diameter was built over the graves of royal persons. The size of the superstructures usually indicated rank of the diseased during his/her life time. The larger a tumulus is, the higher in rank its owner was. The smaller it was, and the lower in rank the owner was. A distinctive element of the Kerma culture was mummification of the diseased body. A mummy was usually placed on top of an Angaraib (bed) which in turn was placed in the middle of the tomb chamber. However mummification was restricted to king and royal persons, however, the commoner classes of Kerma had their own simple was of burial. The diseased was usually laid in a contracted body position with the head towards the east. Flag staffs and square shaped steles were uncovered near tumuli structures and were probably related to mortuary rituals. Pottery is perhaps the most common find in Kerma. Large amounts of imported pottery from Egypt and the Near East and seashells brought from the Red Sea indicated extensive practice of trade in the ancient city of Kerma. Weapons dating to this period were usually consisted of bronze swords and daggers, some of which were found in children graves. Most astonishingly were the archer burials in Kerma where individuals were buried with bows and arrows next to their bodies. Other goods included sandals, leather caps, ostrich feathers, loincloths and cotton kilts. Large numbers of sacrificed humans and animals were found in royal graves. In 1923 George Reisner, the first archeologist to excavate at Kerma, uncovered a tumulus containing sacrificed human bodies2. The scarified bodies were placed in opened roof mud brick corridors that ran along the middle of the tumuli structures before the later were filled with earth. The sacrificed individuals are likely to have been servants and slaves to their diseased owners during their lifetimes. The Nubians believed in an afterlife, where the gods would sometimes require the diseased to do hard labor. Thus sacrificing servants and slaves was considered a way for helping the deceased do this hard labor.
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