The community that prepared it was not struggling to survive — or if it was, the burial of this child took priority over other claims on the community’s time and material.

Why A Three-Year-Old Received Such A Burial

This question does not have a certain answer, and any responsible account of the MA-1 burial has to begin there.

Researchers who study prehistoric burial practices have developed several frameworks for interpreting elaborate child burials.

The most commonly invoked is the argument from inherited status: in societies organized around hereditary social hierarchies, the social position of a child is determined by the family into which the child is born, not by anything the child has yet accomplished.

An infant or toddler born to high-status parents may be buried with the material expressions of that status regardless of their age.