Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41477858›Full record

ArticleScience advances2026

Earliest evidence for intentional cremation of human remains in Africa.

Jessica I Cerezo-Román, Elizabeth Sawchuk, Flora Schilt, Alex Bertacchi, Gina Buckley, Edwin Chibisa, B Patrick Fahey, Sofia Gunilla Hedman Falchenberg, Potiphar Kaliba, Douglas J Kennett and 5 more

Abstract readHistorical Article
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Article in Science advances, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed.

  1. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

15 authors.

Jessica I Cerezo-RománDepartment of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA.ORCID 0000-0002-7752-8079
Elizabeth SawchukCleveland Museum of Natural History, Cleveland, OH, USA.ORCID 0000-0003-4398-2174
Flora SchiltDepartment of Art & Culture, History, and Antiquity, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.ORCID 0000-0002-2144-3017
Alex BertacchiDepartment of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA.ORCID 0000-0002-2269-2437
Gina BuckleyInterdisciplinary Center for Archaeology and Evolution of Human Behaviour, University of the Algarve, Faro, Portugal.ORCID 0000-0001-5399-9311
Edwin ChibisaDepartment of Museums and Monuments, Lilongwe, Malawi.
B Patrick FaheyInstitute of Human Origins, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA.ORCID 0009-0002-4403-9313
Sofia Gunilla Hedman FalchenbergIndependent Researcher, Oslo, Norway.ORCID 0009-0001-2156-3924
Potiphar KalibaDepartment of Museums and Monuments, Lilongwe, Malawi.
Douglas J KennettDepartment of Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara.ORCID 0000-0001-6144-7365
Julio MercaderDepartment of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada.ORCID 0000-0002-5637-7937
Justin PargeterDepartment of Anthropology, New York University, New York, NY, USA.ORCID 0000-0001-6536-8568
Jay StockDepartment of Anthropology, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada.ORCID 0000-0003-0147-8631
Ryan SzymanskiDepartment of Anthropology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA.
Jessica C ThompsonDepartment of Anthropology, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA.ORCID 0000-0003-1627-4949

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Human cremation on an open pyre demands intensive labor, communal resources, and sensory exposures. We report the earliest evidence for intentional cremation in Africa, the oldest in situ adult pyre in the world, and one of only a few associated with hunter-gatherers. A large cremation feature at Hora 1 in Malawi dates to ~9500 years ago and contains the remains of a small, gracile adult with evidence for perimortem defleshing and postcremation manipulation. Subsequent revisiting of the site to build fires in the same place provided additional pyrotechnological spectacles. High-resolution, multiproxy reconstruction of the ritual associated with cremation and its subsequent deposition demonstrates complex mortuary practices among ancient African foraging groups with substantial social investment and use of natural landscape features as persistent mortuary monuments.

Indexed as

ArchaeologyBody RemainsCremationAfricaHistory, AncientHumans

Identifiers

PMID41477858
PMCPMC12757068

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY-NC
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.