Module 11: Informational Books

Bury the Dead: Tombs, Corpses, Mummies, Skeletons, and Rituals by Christopher Sloan

Sloan, C. (2002). Bury the dead: tombs, corpses, mummies, skeletons, and rituals. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic.

Summary

This book discusses the burial rituals and customs of ancient cultures around the world. As the author examines different cultures and how they dealt with death and burial, he also explains how these traditions give us information about how they lived their lives. Sloan discusses important discoveries that have provided archeologists and scientists with crucial information about cultures that have existed around the world. He covers ancient Egyptian burial practices, Neandertal burials, Amazonian tombs and many more. The pictures, time-lines, maps and other graphic details make the book even more engaging. It is a colorful and visually stimulating approach to such an interesting topic. The different beliefs and faiths that govern the many types of burials that have existed all over the world are fascinating to consider.

My Thoughts

I found this book fascinating and eye-opening. The variations in beliefs surrounding death and the afterlife is such an interesting topic to learn about. The way cultures deal with death and provide burial throughout history and in different areas of the world are so unique and tell us so much about their cultures as a whole. The discoveries and excavations that have occurred are also amazing, such as the thousands of clay soldiers buried with the Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang Di. The accompanying pictures and illustrations really help make the book so intriguing because you are able to see the kinds of archeological finds that have been discovered. Although it discusses death and some of the pictures of excavated bodies and skeletons are somewhat gross, I think that this book is age appropriate for its audience. The author explains rituals and traditions in fairly easy to understand ways and keeps his historical discussions simple and interesting. This book would work well in a discussion or program about different world cultures because it covers so many different ones, ancient and modern, and examines such an important tradition in these cultures.

Review

Gr. 5–9. Kids will find it hard to resist picking up a book with words like corpses and skeletons in the title. And this one doesn’t disappoint. Sloan, an editor at National Geographic magazine and the author of two previous books for children, does a terrific job of providing an intriguing, reader-friendly text that is not overshadowed by the fabulous color photographs from the National Geographic Society’s archives. These pictures do not shirk from their subject: a fullpage photo of a Peruvian mummy staring out from his burial cloth, his knees raised to his chest; a close-up of a “bog person” clearly showing, as the caption says, skin turned to leather by acidic conditions in the swamp. There are also many pictures of excavations, artifacts, and burial sites. Along with discussions of how and why people bury their dead are chapters on particular peoples and their traditions. There’s material on the Egyptians, of course, but also on the Chinese, the terra-cotta soldiers of the Qin dynasty, and the Russian tombs of the Amazon women who lived between 800 and 100 B.C.E. Sloan had access to experts to vet his book, and it shows. This has the ring of authority and the look of quality. Cooper, I. Booklist, 2002.