The project ‘Ethical entanglements’ aims to theorise and explore ethical debate around the treatment of human remains in museums and research institutions. It moves beyond the dichotomies of Indigenous/Western, science/spirituality and respect/abuse to embrace ambiguity, complexity and messiness. While the project identifies possible approaches to ethical challenges, it does so not through simplification or paring down to ‘solve’ ethics, but by attempting to identify the values and attitudes that inform current practice through international and interdisciplinary comparison. Centred on Sweden, where the debate on human remains in museums is rapidly developing, the project examines attitudes within the museum and research communities against a background of broader public debate. Three linked sub-projects approach the philosophical underpinnings of this discussion through three case studies of practices in Swedish museums, concerns of biomolecular researchers and key issues related to the identified and the anonymous dead.

 Mesolithic research has undergone a series of important transformations over the past several decades, making it one of the most dynamic and prolific fields of archaeology today. The handbook captures our ambition to demonstrate the plurality of perspectives and developments in Mesolithic research, combining theoretically new and innovative questions strongly valuing the methodological connection to the empirical record. The handbookIt consists of fifty-nine# chapters giving voice to a diverse set of authors including established senior researchers and scholars at the beginning of their career, from across the study area. This has enabled us to deliver broad overviews and case studies on the seven key topics of Mesolithic Europe:, Mesolithic gGeographies;, hHunter-gatherer lLandscapes;, Mesolithic life;,mMeaningful tTechnology;, dDeath and the dDead;, cCosmologies;, and rRitual and sSymbolism. We believe that the archaeology of Mesolithic Europe will continue to growdevelop from the strengths demonstrated in this volume, which is its diversity, its commitment to collaborative research, and to a unique connection of exciting exploratory theory, a grounding in the empirical evidence, and a potential to continue to grow with the development of scientific methods.

 The mortuary record of the Mesolithic of Europe presents a significant variability in the treatment of the body. While the most well-known burials are inhumations, often from large formal disposal areas, or cemeteries, many other ways of treating the dead body occurred, including cremation, manipulation, exposure to the elements, submersion in water, and even mummification. This chapter presents this range of treatment in these hunter- gatherer communities with an approach that centreers archaeological method and theory with a focus on the ritualized handling of the dead body as a fundamental aspect of the mortuary ritual as a rite of passage. The chapter proposes that, by analysing the ways in which the dead body was treated, we can glean insight into the hunter- gatherer cosmology in which they were an integral part, and the place that death and the dead held within it. This is accomplished by discussing aspects such as the maintenance and dissolution of the individual human body, the framing of different kinds of bodies (human and animal), the significance of place for the dead and the living, and by analysing transformation and violence against the cadaver. 

 Research into the Mesolithic has recently undergone important transformations, making it one of the most dynamic fields of archaeological research today. These changes are the result of a combination of factors: new and exciting discoveries, the impact of innovative scientific methods, and the introduction of fresh interpretative approaches. Situated within a long period defined by significant environmental, demographic, and social change, the European Mesolithic period provides key insights to answer the "big questions" in archaeology, including the deep history of migration, diversity, and adaptation. It also provides resources for elucidating answers to complex questions about human relationships, diet, economy, and identity. New theoretical approaches to the Mesolithic in Europe have expanded research into new areas such as lived experience, ritual, cosmology, art, identity, the body, and human-animal relationships. These new research questions have added important nuance, and provided a more complete understanding of the period. 

With contributions from leading scholars in the field and from across the continent, The Oxford Handbook of Mesolithic Europe provides the first comprehensive overview of the rich archaeology of Mesolithic Europe. Chapters on different European regions, as well as neighboring areas in North Africa and the Middle East, provide a synoptic view, with thematic chapters examining the lived experience of different kinds of landscapes and adaptations, different forms of technology, and aspects of Mesolithic life, death, ritual, cosmology, and art. The volume highlights both the significance of interdisciplinary research for the field, and the importance of combining perspectives and approaches when studying the deep past.

This chapter highlights the ways in which the analysis of mortuary practice in archaeology moves between metanarratives and small-scale histories of human experience. It argues that while all deaths cause change and instability, mortuary rituals become arenas to handle this crisis. To be effective, rituals must make sense within their context, and as cultures and societies change, so do the rituals, albeit rarely in a straightforward and simple way. Archaeology has often used observations of change in the mortuary record as passive indices of broader social and cultural change – often favouring clean, simple and monocausal explanations. The chapters in this book invite us to take a closer look at the archaeological record and analyse it at a human scale. This perspective allows the authors to approach mortuary rituals as mechanisms in the process, and as a result a more diverse, more complex, and more interesting past is revealed in the archaeological record.

With a rich, well-dated Early Upper Palaeolithic layer, the Mughr el-Hamamah cave site is key for understanding the Middle-Upper Palaeolithic transition in the Levant. The archaeological deposit consists of two units. Layer A resulted from pastoral activities during the 20th century and Layer B dated between 44.5 and 40.0 ky BP. During Layer A’s formation, shepherds disturbed Layer B, redepositing Early Upper Palaeolithic sediments and lithic artefacts in Layer A matrix. Activity from Layer A’s formation also resulted in spatially patchy percolation and bioturbation, leaving microarchaeological traces such as dung spherulites in some areas in Layer B. In contrast, contemporaneous chemical diagenetic processes from Layer B’s primary formation caused spatially uneven post-depositional dissolution of animal bone. In this article we present a multi-proxy microarchaeological approach to investigate the post-depositional processes in Layer B, focussing on possible impacts on the plant archaeological record. The identification of intrusive spherulites from shepherds’ activities define the limits of disturbance in Layer B. Micromorphological analyses have identified four intact micro-facies in Layer B, representing an interplay of natural and anthropogenic factors. Micromorphological details in bedded combustion features favour the interpretation that associated phytoliths represent fuel traces. Dicot fruit phytoliths occur in the western area of the cave, where well-preserved charred wood and seeds were also found. Grass-diagnostic phytoliths correspond to C3 and C4 taxa, indicating an overall humid environment with dry spells. Microarchaeological analysis identifies traces of both bedded and dispersed hearth materials, mixed with variable plant resources for food, fuel, and possibly other uses. This strengthens the interpretation of Mughr el-Hamamah Layer B as a dense, complicated palimpsest of recurring activities, formed over many millennia.

As a corridor for population movement out of Africa, the southern Levant is a natural laboratory for research exploring the dynamics of the Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition. Yet, the number of well-preserved sites dating to the initial millennia of the Early Upper Paleolithic (EUP; ~45–30 ka) remains limited, restricting the resolution at which we can study the biocultural and techno-typological changes evidenced across the transition. With EUP deposits dating to 45–39 ka cal BP, Mughr el-Hamamah, Jordan, offers a key opportunity to expand our understanding of EUP lifeways in the southern Levant. Mughr el-Hamamah is particularly noteworthy for its large faunal assemblage, representing the first such assemblage from the Jordan Valley. In this paper, we present results from taxonomic and taphonomic analyses of the EUP fauna from Mughr el-Hamamah. Given broader debates about shifts in human subsistence across the Middle-to-Upper Paleolithic transition, we also assess ev- idence for subsistence intensification, focusing especially on the exploitation of gazelle and the use of small game. Taphonomic data suggest that the fauna was primarily accumulated by human activity. Ungulates dominate the assemblage; gazelle (Gazella sp.) is the most common taxa, followed by fallow deer (Dama meso- potamica) and goat (Capra sp.). Among the gazelle, juveniles account for roughly one-third of the sample. While the focus on gazelle and the frequency of juveniles are consistent with broader regional trends, evidence for the regular exploitation of marrow from gazelle phalanges suggests that the EUP occupants of Mughr el-Hamamah processed gazelle carcasses quite intensively. Yet, the overall degree of dietary intensification appears low- —small game is rare and evidence for human capture of this game is more equivocal. As a whole, our results support a growing body of data showing gradual shifts in animal exploitation strategies across the Middle-to- Upper Paleolithic transition in the southern Levant.

Collections of old human remains in museums are currently under increased scrutiny and pressure. On the one hand they are problematised from a post-colonial and human rights point of view as the material remains of historic and ongoing structural violence connected to scientific knowledge production. On the other, new methods in archaeological science have led to increasing demand for destructive sampling. Without guidance and support by laws and formal standardised professional guidelines, museums may find themselves squeezed from two opposing sides. Based on an analysis of laws and professional guidelines, and a large-scale survey of the practical handling of old human remains in Swedish museums, this article argues that the lack of a shared professional process that recognises the complexity of old human remains as both objects of science and lived lives, risks undermining the role of museums in their relationship to both the public and the research community.

In their article, Jane Anderson and Sonya Atalay propose that we rethink repatriation. Instead of viewing it as mainly about transfer of ownership, they propose that we also understand it as a pedagogic opportunity. The power of this suggestion lies not only in the benefits of learning, which, of course are fundamental, but also in the realization that repatriation is necessary—not only for descending communities but also for the institutions that are in possession of their cultural heri- tage and ancestors. I argue that while native interest and survival are and should remain central to repatriation as a process, it is increasingly also becoming about the survival of these institutions—their reputation, their legitimacy, and their sustainability. Perhaps we have reached a point where museums and other institutions holding collections from indigenous communities need the process of repatriation as much as the communities of origin.