| Abstract: |
Mortuary traditions reflect aspects of life of a past community, including their access to resources and technological developments. This study investigates differences between the mortuary goods excavated from two Iron Age “moated” occupation and cemetery sites, Ban Non Wat and Noen U-Loke, located in the Upper Mun Valley of the Khorat Plateau, Northeast Thailand. Material culture associated with industrial and funerary activities was recovered during excavation. These mortuary goods were employed to examine potential resources, trade and technologies that may have influenced the industrial, cultural, social, political, and religious developments of the Iron Age. The purpose of this dissertation is to compare and relate the Iron Age mortuary samples excavated from Ban Non Wat and Noen U-Loke that are located approximately three kilometres apart. Four distinct Iron Age mortuary phases were previously identified at Noen U-Loke. Unreported mortuary goods and burial treatments from the recent excavations of seven Iron Age burials at Ban Non Wat, a site with a chronology spanning from the Neolithic to the present era, are documented. It was concluded that the Ban Non Wat burial sample was most similar to mortuary phases two and three at Noen U-Loke. The analysis of artefacts from the two sites found similarities that confirm funerary practices characteristic of the early Iron Age and differences suggestive of regional, economic and social aspects in mortuary practices, trade and exchange activities, and the development of industries and technologies. Both the Ban Non Wat and Noen U-Loke excavations exposed occupation and cemetery layers. Both sites provided evidence for spinning and for the exchange of marine items, Indian influenced ornaments and perhaps red ochre. Pig remains were important to mortuary rituals at both sites and fish remains were prominent in the Ban Non Wat sample. There was extensive evidence of ceramic specialisation at Ban Non Wat. Bronze and iron were more abundant at Noen U-Loke, particularly in the later mortuary phases, but there was greater evidence for casting over the entire Ban Non Wat site. Local rice production was suggested in some Noen U-Loke burials. Salt processing was likely to have been an important economic activity, seen in the presence of salt working mounds to the east of Noen U-Loke. This research essay concludes that the early Iron Age burials of Ban Non Wat and Noen U-Loke had common mortuary traditions. The excavated mortuary goods provide archaeological data of value to the understanding of cultural traditions and social, political, industrial and economic pre-state progress throughout the Upper Mun Valley of Iron Age Northeast Thailand.
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