MODE OF SEPULTURE. 245 



The Paraguas of Paraguay place their dead in a similar attitude. — De Azara, 

 Voy. dans rdmerique^ 11, p, 143. This custom, as practised among the Atures, 

 in the Valley of the Orinoco, has already been stated, (page 134.) 



Garcilaso de la Vega states that in the year 1560, he saw five embalmed 

 bodies of Peruvian Incas, three men and tw^o w^omen. " They were seated in the 

 manner of Indians, with the hands across upon the breast, and their eyes towards 

 the earth:'— Comment. Book V, Chap. 29.— " The mountain Indians," says 

 Herrera, "commonly built their tombs high, like towers, and hollow; and they 

 buried their dead bowing the body, their thighs bound and in the sitting attitude." 

 — Hist. Dec. Ill, Lib. 9, Cap. 3. — Dr. Ruschenberger, who personally exhumed 

 several mummies near Arica, states that " the body was placed in a squatting 

 posture, with the knees drawn up and the hands applied to the side of the head." 

 (See page 109 of this work.) I have myself examined the desiccated bodies of 

 six Peruvians, all of which were in the same position. 



The Indians of New Grenada followed the same custom, as is proved by the 

 annexed illustration. The Spanish residents of that republic have a tradition that 

 the natives, flying from the violence of their conquerors, died in caves and other 

 obscure places, in an attitude which truly seems indicative of despair. Some 

 very ancient monuments are said by Herrera to have been discovered by the early 

 Spaniards near Zenu, in Venezuela : " These graves or tombs were magnificent, 

 adorhed with broad stones, into which the bodies were placed in a sitting posture." 

 — Hist. Amer. IV, p. 221. 



The Mexicans sometimes burned and sometimes buried their dead : when 

 they buried them it was " in deep ditches formed of stone and lime, within which 

 they placed the bodies in a sitting posture, on low seats, or icpalU:' — Clayigero, 

 Hist, of Mexico, B. VI.— The same author adds, that Quinetzin, one of the early 

 Chechemecan kings of Mexico, was embalmed '^ and afterwards placed in a great 

 chair, clothed in royal habits." — Idem, B. II. 



When a Charib died his body was placed in the grave in an attitude " resem- 

 bling that in which they crouched round the fire or the table when alive, with the 

 elbows on the knees, and the palms of the hands against the cheeks." — Sheldon, 

 in Archxolog. Amer. I, p. 378. — Sir W. Young, Account of the Charibs, p. 8. 



The Muskogees or Creeks had a similar usage. — Bartram, Trav. p. 515. — 

 Romans, Hist, of Florida, I, p. 98. — The latter author adds that the Arkansas 

 were in the same practice, " with the addition of tying the head down to the 

 knees." — Idem, p. 101. 



The Alibamons bury their dead in a sitting posture ; in order to justify this 

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