- IJ
160: Skeletal bone colours
Just to explore something new, here are three photos showing bone colour of the femur portion we found that came in with the fill from somewhere near Naike at the end of last year. The first shows the bone in-situ, with the bone interior blackened with mineral absorption and moisture. The next two photos show two bone fragments when dry before the bone was assembled. They show the effects of burning in a fire. Was it as a result of cooking and cannibalism? It might have been.
Is that why they are burned? We cannot be sure but we believe a great burning of people or bodies occurred in the hills further south of the now abandoned cave entrance. There was definitely something more sinister going on 650 years ago along the Waikato coast where the ancients had many settlements on hilltops; but no defensive pas’ – after all, why would they need defensive pa’s? These settlement earthworks are not like anywhere else in NZ that we’ve found yet. Their layout is different and not related to anything else. Some Maori defensive earthworks have been built afterward.
The name meanings of many of the hills and streams to the west and south of the target point are filled with sorrow, grief, bitterness, burning, and even ‘tall’ burning. Many streams and hills have names that are not fully Maori nor have conclusive interpretations. Something happened in these areas to these ancient tall people the Maori do not want to talk about. This area was definitely pre-inhabited before Polynesians arrive and slaughtered, killed, cannibalized, burned and destroyed them; at least, that is our assumption based on names, the feel of the area and the burnt human bone of an at least 7’10” human male (unless it’s female in which case she was over 8’1”). Once again, a reminder that there was in fact, a tall race (1/3 taller) here that was eliminated. Most people, even those that oppose us, admit the old stories tell of them. But not academia… no, they deny it all.
You cannot deny this bone which has been confirmed as 98% human.
Ok, back to the burnt bones. Changes to the bone occur when a burning process exposes the bone to dehydration, eliminating the water content and organic portion within the bone, altering the micro-structure of the hard matrix and causes the bone to change colour and display heat-induced fractures. Colour changes exhibit by cremated bones are usually applied to interpret the cremation contexts, related to the firing temperature, the duration of the fire and the combustion circumstances. The latter is also influenced by other variables such as the oxygen levels, the levels, the presence of metals, minerals etc.
A single bone element may be observed with different colours since the fire never burns uniformly through the entire surface at once. Colour changes to the bones surface can be described with numerous designations as people interpret colours differently.
You may notice the similarities in composition of both set of bones. One is of our bone just unearthed (left), the other from a Mastedon
The initial colouring of the heat-induced bones produce a light amber,which indicated that the bones still contains an organic component, however, as the burning continues, the colour darkens and begins to blacken. This is when the temperature reaches very high temperatures and where the bones micro-structure is affected. Dehydration of the bone causes the micro-structure to recrystallize and eventually cover the surface of the bone with fractures and cracks, and alter the bone structure through shrinkage. The bone can turn grey when the temperature reaches 600 degrees celsius (such as a crematorium), where most of the organic content is lost affecting the shape and size of the bones structure. As the temperature rises, the colour to the bone changes to blue-grey, before it becomes white, which is the endpoint colour that occurs once the temperature reaches 800c (cremation temperatures are between 750-1100 c). In bones burned in fires not designed to reduce the bone to ash (umu ovens) alternative colouring can also occur on the bone surface and includes the colours brown, pink, yellow, red and green. Brown colouring is associated with the presence of oxygen transporting protein, or soil discolouration (as in the case of the bone show above) whereas colours like green, yellow, pink and red are often associated with the presence of metals. However, these colours (pink, yellow, red and green) may also be caused by soil staining, natural bleaching, or organic staining depending on the makeup of the ground upon which they lie after burning.
This bone we found came from a body that ended up underground after burning, either in an umu and was broken to extract the marrow, or was buried in a pit; such as the ones they used for housing, and was broken when brought into the cave tube with the fill. These pits we refer to are different to the Kumara pits Maori used. Kumara only came here about 700 years ago and were always associated with other ground works like defensive pa.
