ABSTRACT
Cremation burial has a relatively limited distribution in the ethnographic record of North America. It appears prehistorically in the eastern United States but was an infrequent custom in historic periods. The practice of cremation was common from Mendocino County south and east to central Arizona. The Yuman tribes of the Lower Colorado River, specifically the Mohave, Quechan, and Cocopahs, practice an elaborate version of the California cremation tradition. The Riverine Yuman cremation practices include a number of features that are universal in the California Cremation Complex. The cremation rites and mourning ritual were embedded in the social organization of cultural groups and were important ritual reaffirmations of that organization. The most pronounced differences in social organization, as related to cremations, lay in the area of leadership. The riverine Yuman cremation complex is obviously not a perfect analogue to the Hohokam cremation complex. This is true both at the level of practices and social relations.
