The most remarkable individual in the entire cemetery, from the perspective of what it reveals about this community’s values, was an adolescent male of approximately fifteen years.

He had spina bifida — a congenital condition involving incomplete closure of the spinal cord’s protective covering — in a form severe enough that it almost certainly left him paralyzed below the waist.

For a hunter-gatherer community that moved frequently, that required physical participation in food procurement, that had no carts or wheelchairs or modern mobility aids, supporting an individual who could not walk would have required sustained collective effort.

Someone — many people, over many years — had to carry this young man as the group moved through the landscape.